Criminal Minds: Stranded
by guiltybreadstick
Summary: When the team is stranded on an island after their jet crashes when coming back from a case in Mexico, how far will they go to survive? Will it bring them closer together or tear them apart? And when one of the team is injured, time is running out.
1. Crash

Aaron Hotchner was not easily disturbed. Part of his job description was to be able to remain calm during stressful situations. But when the jet that was carrying him and the rest of his team got struck by lightning, his temperate facade fell away.

They had been coming back from a particularly difficult case in Campeche Mexico. The local authorities had called in their team when they realised what was going on was out of their hands. Someone had been abducting and killing all different kinds of victims with no age, race, or gender preferences. Eventually they found the man and realised that he suffered from schizoaffective disorder. He had claimed that God had made him do it and that the people he had killed were suffering from the sins of humanity. Hotch had needed a drink after that. But he never did get that drink. About 20 minutes into their flight back, the weather had started to turn sour. He watched out the window as the clouds darkened around them.

The pilot had come out of the cockpit and said, "We're experiencing some minor turbulence. The storm is getting pretty bad and it's not expected to get better anytime soon. If worst comes to worst, we may have to fly back inland and land the plane."

"Thank you," Hotch had replied.

"Jesus Christ." Rossi muttered under his breath as he buckled his seatbelt and curled his fingers tightly around the armrests.

"Relax Rossi." Reid said from his seat next to Morgan, "Only around 12 percent of plane crashes are due to weather. Ever since aircrafts have become more reliable, the main source of plane crashes has become pilot error. Since aircrafts are so complex, there is more room for tactical error, and since the pilot has to actively engage with the craft at every stage of the flight, there are various occasions in which something could go wrong. Only about-" Reid hadn't managed to finish his sentence before Morgan cut him off.

"Okay kid, I think he gets the point." Reid looked dejected for a moment before returning to his book.

"At least if we got into a plane crash I wouldn't have to deal with all this paperwork." Emily quipped.

"Strauss would probably hunt you down and make you do it even if you were on a remote island." JJ teased back.

"Can we please stop talking about this?" Rossi gritted out through clenched teeth. Morgan laughed and Hotch had even cracked a rare smile.

Then it happened.

Hotch had just closed his eyes to try and get some sleep. Suddenly he felt a jolt go through his entire body. His eyes flew open. He looked around desperately trying to find the source of the disturbance.

"What the hell just happened?" Rossi demanded, his eyes wild.

"Is everyone alright?" Hotch asked. He looked around meeting each of his teammates eyes. A moment of calm passed over him, but it only lasted a second.

The plane started it's nose dive. Hotch didn't even have time to react. He floated up in his seat as he fell in time with the plunging aircraft. He grabbed onto the arm of his seat in a frantic attempt to ground himself. The plane suddenly leveled and he felt himself slump harshly back into his seat. The pilot came rushing from the front of the plane, looking frantic.

"You all need to prepare yourselves for an emergency landing. We've been struck by lightning and the vertical stabilizer came completely off. I've managed to level us out but we're still definitely going down. If I am correct, there should be an island close to here but a water landing would be best in this situation. There is an emergency inflatable raft located in the back. You guys go ahead and get that ready. We need to be as quick as possible, I don't know how much longer I can keep this up." and with that he surged back forward into the cockpit.

"Oh my God" JJ uttered as she got out of her seat. Morgan also stood and shakily made his way to the back of the plane. Hotch got up and clambored his way over to Morgan, steadying himself on the back of the seats on his way. Together they pulled out the bright orange raft which immediately started to expand. For a second the only sound was Rossi muttering soft prayers to himself.

Hotch looked at each of his teammates in turn; Rossi was praying to himself with his eyes closed, JJ was standing a little ways away from the raft and her eyes were searching frantically, Morgan stood next to him trying to busy himself with the raft, Reid stood the furthest away his face pale and eyes wide, and Emily was the only one still sitting down, her shiny black hair hiding her face. Hotch himself tried to remain calm and put on a brave face for the others sake. But he was genuinely afraid. He could deal with people. People were predictable and he could always figure out what they were going to do next. But nature was erratic and uncertain. He had no idea what was going to happen next.

The pilot came back out from the cockpit and said, "alright, I have the plane hovering about 20 feet above the water, but I can't keep it that way for long. You're going to need to jump. I'm going to open up the door and you will go one at a time and jump on to the raft."

Before anyone could reply, Rossi said, "are you insane? If we do that we'll die."

"You'll die if you stay here." the pilot stated simply. Hotch envied the calm demeanor that the pilot managed to keep.

"I'll go first." Hotch said. He knew that it would have to be him. He was the leader after all.

"Okay. We have to do this quickly. I'll go up front, open up the door, and try to keep this baby level for you."

"What about you?" Prentiss piped up.

"This is what I'm trained for. I'll figure something out." he replied. Before any of them could argue, he flashed a smile and disappeared into the front of the plane.

Hotch braced himself against the doorway, holding the now fully blown-up raft in front of him. He loosened his tie and took a deep breath in. The door opened up exposing him to the harsh elements outside. Rain assaulted his face and the wind whipped savagely. His heart beat fast against his chest at the thought of what he was about to do. Before he could think any more, he gripped the raft tightly and jumped. For a second he was falling through the air and an odd calm overtook him. Then he was brutally pulled back to reality as he hit the water with a jolt. In his dazed state, he had somehow managed to get the raft underneath him so that now he was sprawled on his back on the springy orange plastic.

He sat up and blinked away the rain until he could see JJ waiting in the doorway of the plane. He nodded his head in consent and saw her small form leap through the air. She landed next to him and expertly rolled across the 7ft by 4ft raft, significantly lessening the impact.

Next came Rossi, landing slightly less gracefully than JJ on his backside. He rolled over with a groan and cleared the way for the next to jump: Emily. When she landed, she nearly missed and Hotch had to grab on to her arm to steady her. She looked up at him gratefully and moved to where the others were. Next was Spencer. When he jumped, he really did miss the small orange dinghy and landed with a splash in the surrounding waves. Hotch looked over the rim, eyes desperately scanning the dark angry waves. A second later, he saw brown locks bob above the surface. Hotch reached out to grab onto the collar of the young agents sweater vest and hoisted him onto the boat. Reids eyes slowly blinked open and he looked up at JJ, who was cradling his head in her lap the way only a mother could.

Hotch looked up to Morgan and gave him the thumbs up signal to let him know it was safe to come down. The dark skinned agent didn't need any more encouragement and he plummeted out of the plane. He landed with a soft impact on the elastic material. Hotch let out a breath he hadn't known he had been holding when all of his team was safely on board.

Hotch looked up, searching for the pilot. He looked up to the cockpit and saw the man gazing down upon him. It was far away but even with the distance he could make out the figure smiling a mournful smile. Hotch watched as the man sat back in his chair, away from the controls of the plane and closed his eyes. The plane, with nothing holding it up any longer, plummeted to the shadowy water below.

Hotch blanched and lurched forward. His attempt did nothing however as their small craft was swept away in a wave from the splash the plane had made. It took all of his energy just to hang on to the edge. He looked around, trying to get a look at the quickly disappearing jet. Not even a glimpse. Hotch said a silent thank you to the man that had risked his life to save all of theirs.

"Is everyone alright?" Hotch found himself asking for the second time that day. He was met by silent nods.

"Where's the pilot?" Morgan asked.

"I saw him go down with the plane. I think he knew all along that he wasn't going to make it out alive so he did everything he could to protect us. He was a very brave man." the team was stunned. JJ lifted her hands to her mouth and let out a slight cry. All the while the rain pelted them, water pounding at every surface it could reach. Hotch's hair was plastered to his face and he did the best he could to wipe it out of his eyes.

Everyone huddled together on the uneven surface of the raft, trying their best to ignore the rain and stay warm. They were all obviously cold, but Spencer seemed to be fairing the worst, having fallen into the frigid sea only moment ago.

Suddenly, they lurched to a halt, bumping up against something solid.

"We've hit land" he announced.

"Thank the Lord." Rossi breathed as he stumbled over to where they had hit something. In the dark and the rain, it was hard to see exactly where they were, but it seemed to be some kind of landmass. Hotch stepped over the front of the boat, his socked feet (having lost his shoes in the commotion) meeting rough coral under a few feet of water. After being on an unsteady raft for so long, he was a bit shaky on his feet. The coarse coral bit into his calloused feet, the socks offering little protection. The others followed suit, slowly getting out of the unsteady raft. The cold water ebbed up his pant legs and clung to his ankles, but that was the least of his worries right now. He grabbed onto the edge of the raft motioning for the others to do the same and lifted it slightly out of the water.

An unspoken silence fell over the group as they trudged closer to what seemed to be a small island. Hotch could make out the slight form of trees in the distance. The rain had eased up slightly but still made it harder for him to see and everything was shrouded in a light fog.

After a couple of minutes, they reached the end of the coral and a soft welcoming sand took its place. Hotch's sock clad feet left firm footprints leading a trail up from the waters edge. They all stopped to catch their breath and looked around. The island was small and the sandy beach stretched out to the left and right until it gave way to the curvature. A little ways inland, there were twisty trees that looked to be mangroves. When Hotch looked further, he could see that the island was more of an atol, and there looked to be some sort of lagoon past the thin scattering of trees.

"What is this place?" Emily asked, voicing all of their inner thoughts.

"I think we may be on one of the nine islands of the Marquesa Keys. There are three main islands in the gulf of Mexico, The Marquesa Keys, Scorpion Reef, and Cayo Levisa. Our flight path would have put us most directly over the Marquesa Keys. It's about 30 miles West of Key West and it is technically a part of the Florida Keys. It has zero inhabitants but is visited about twice annually by members of the National Wildlife Refuge. The islands cover about 2.54 square miles of land. Certain parts of the island are protected by the National Wildlife Refuge. That's really all I know." Reid said

" _All_ he knows." Morgan snorted

"Alright, that's good Reid. It's good to have a bit of background information. I say we make a temporary shelter for the night to try to get out of the rain, and we can regroup and figure things out tomorrow." Hotch said. Everyone nodded, clearly weakened from the days events.

"Morgan, Prentiss, come help me use this raft to provide temporary shelter from the rain. The rest of you, see if any of our cellphones work out here." The team happily obliged, clearly pleased that they had something to work on.

Hotch Grabbed one end of the raft and Morgan grabbed the other while Emily walked alongside them. When they got to the treeline, they set the raft down.

"Look for two sturdy trees that we can lodge the raft in between to make a makeshift shelter." Hotch instructed.

After a moment of looking Morgan called out, "Over here guys, I think I got somethin' good." Hotch and Emily strode over to him and saw two trees about 7ft apart that looked solid enough to hold the raft between them. Hotch grabbed the raft and hoisted the bulk of it onto his shoulders. Emily and Derek grabbed either end and helped him to wedge it between the trees. When they were done, they has a solid little shelter. Hotch stepped back and admired their handy work. It wasn't perfect but it would keep them dry.

"I'll go get the others," Emily said as she turned and walked in the direction that their friends has been.

"This is bad, isn't it Hotch?" Morgan asked. Hotch turned and saw Morgan looked unnerved. He was surprised to see the look of anguish on the usually sober agents face.

"Yes, it is. But we're going to get through this how we always do; as a team."

"I'm scared, man." Hotch was stunned to hear this admission of fear from the prideful man but managed to keep his expression even.

"We've been through worse than this. We'll get out of here. I promise you." Morgan didn't say anything but looked grateful to the older agent. At that moment, Emily came back with the rest of the team.

"Any luck with the cell phones?" Hotch asked them.

"Nope. All drenched. I always knew those godforsaken machines were useless." Rossi growled. Hotch sighed. He hadn't exactly expected it to work but the hope had still managed to creep into him, infecting him like the plague.

"On a brighter note, the shelter looks good!" JJ exclaimed. Hotch could tell she was trying so hard to stay positive. He knew she was putting on a brave face for them.

"Thank you. It's only temporary, but it will do for now." he replied. They all settled down underneath the semi-dry shelter. They all huddled together, bodies pressing close in search of warmth. In normal circumstances, Hotch would have been embarrassed by this, but these were not normal circumstances.

For a while, the only sound that was heard was the chattering of teeth, the howling of the wind, and the rhythmic beating of the rain. It was disturbing to the unit chief to not be doing something, to not have a plan. But he could tell that what the team needed most right now was a moment of rest. After the sudden adrenaline burst, everyone was feeling exhausted, including him. Soon they would come up with a plan, but right now, the best thing to do was wait. As sleep slowly started to claim him, the last thing he thought was that he was damn well sure that he was going to get his team off this island.

 **Authors** **Note: Okay so this is my first attempt at fan fiction so let me start off by saying: I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT PLANES. I've never even been on one. So as some of the commenters suggested, I did some research to try and make this as accurate as I can. I know its not perfect and if anyone has any suggestions for how I can make it better, please let me know. Obviously, I am inexperienced, so any feedback would be welcome. Thanks for the read.**


	2. And Burn

That night, Spencer Reid didn't get any sleep. Sure, he had closed his eyes and leaned his head on Emily's shoulder. But his mind was racing a thousand miles an hour. Recalling every fact he could summon about plane crashes and their survivors. Of coarse he had read plenty of books about survival, but he had never imagined he would need to put that knowledge into practice. It had always been theoretical for him, never objective. He knew that an astonishing 95.7 percent of people involved in plane crashes did not suffer fatal injuries. But he also knew that the odds of surviving the crash lessened the longer they were stranded out here. The higher the risk of infection or starvation or dehydration. So it bothered him to not be doing anything.

All night thoughts like these raced through his mind, so when the sun started to emerge on the horizon, it was a welcome distraction. He was vaguely aware that the rain had stopped at some point in the night, but it was made clear when he groggily opened his eyes. The sun's rays already felt scorching and he suspected that the heat of the day was going to be just as extreme as the chill of the night.

Being careful not to disturb any of his team members, he gingerly got up from his position underneath the raft. His entire body was aching from staying in such a cramped position for so long. He could already feel the effects the lack of sleep was having on his body. He reached up and tried to rub the sleep away with his fists. He squinted against the harsh rays of the sun that were glinting off the water and into his eyes. The early signs of a migraine were starting to present themselves, the familiar pulsing pain right behind his forehead.

He staggered to the water's edge and clumsily fell to his knees. The water lapped at the legs of his pants but he hardly noticed. He cupped some of the salty water in his hands and splashed it on his face. The quick sensation

had the desired effect, providing temporary relief from the pressure building behind his eyes.

Slowly, he got back up to his feet and took in their surroundings for the first time in daylight. He could now see that the sporadic trees were mangroves, easily identified by their twisted roots and bushy tops. Spencer knew that mangroves extensive root systems often supported other kinds of life and he filed that away in his list of potential resources for later. He could see that beyond the mangroves there was a sort of lagoon looking body of water. He knew that lagoons could offer sustenance in the form of some sort of nutrition. Many organisms could survive in a lagoon. Unfortunately, he also knew that lagoons are usually at least to some degree saline so the water would not be drinkable. Finding fresh water would be priority number one when the team woke up. The human body can only go on average three to five days without water.

But not right now. Spencer knew that the team needed rest. He just wished he could join them. But he couldn't bring himself to relax enough to sleep.

After standing at the water's edge and thinking for a few minutes, he decided to explore the island a little. He wouldn't go out of sight of the raft and the rest of the team, just far enough to see what was beyond the bend. The bead of sweat collecting on his forehead reminded him of the sweltering temperatures. He stripped off his sweater vest, leaving just his button up. He rolled up the sleeves to his elbows in an attempt to ward off the heat. He peeled off his socks and rested them carefully on top of his neatly folded vest. Bending down, he rolled up his wet pant legs a few times. He stepped over his pile of clothes and started off in the direction he intended to explore.

Looking behind his shoulder every so often to make sure the raft was still insight he walked towards what he hoped would be running water. As he walked, the sand turned from fine to more coarse, the granular material sticking between his toes. Soon the terrain turned to full on rocks. He noted that they were mostly limestone. The rocks seemed to be getting bigger the further he went. Too soon, he reached the point where he couldn't see the raft any more and he was forced to turn around. On his way back, he had the time to really take in what had happened to them. Spencer Reid knew that the percent of people who got in plane crashes was 0.000009 percent. And the percent of plane crashes that were caused by weather were about 12 percent. So that made the likelihood of getting in a plane crash due to weather was about 0.00000108 percent of a chance. Spencer had never been lucky before. In fact, his luck had never really been favorable. From Tobias Hankel to his migraines, he had never seemed to catch a break. But this. This was a whole new level. And his whole team was involved this time. It didn't seem fair.

Suddenly, the sun glinted off of something and caught his eye. He looked down and saw a small piece of clear glass amounge the rocks. It looked to have been there for some time, with a little bit of algae covering it. He wondered briefly where it had come from before bending down to pick it up. He rubbed away all the green with his thumb and avoided the sharp edges. He pocketed the glass, thinking it may be useful later, and continued the walk back.

When Reid returned, he was slightly surprised to see the team was still asleep. He decided the best thing for him to do would be wait for them to wake up. Rousing them would feel cruel, he determined. Hotch was leaned against one of the trees that was supporting the raft. Even in slumber, his eyebrows seemed to be knit together in concentration. JJ's head was lolled drowsily on Hotch's shoulder, her blonde ponytail loose but still together. Rossi was curled on his side, his head rested on JJ's shins. The oldest profiler practically looked comfortable. Emily was laying on her back using her arms as a pillow behind her head. Her normally perfect lipstick was smeared on her face. Morgan was leaning against the other tree. His face looked almost unnatural without the dark shades that normally covered his eyes. Looking at all of his teammates like this, he suddenly became overwhelmed by feelings of fondness and appreciation. They had gone through so much together. Really, this was just another obstacle for them to overcome.

Spencer thought it was about 20 minutes before they woke up, but really he didn't know. Time seemed different here. JJ was the first to wake up.

When she saw him sitting in the sand a few feet away she drowsily said, "Spence?" he had watched as realization flooded her eyes and she remembered where she was. When JJ stirred, the rest of the team was alerted one by one.

"Are we really here? I thought this was a nightmare." Rossi said. His attempt at humor fell flat when no one responded. Spencer watched as they all got up and stretched their sore limbs.

"Okay. I say we divide and concor. There are many tasks that need doing and we have to get our priorities straight." Hotch said, not wasting any time.

"Alright, so we need a good shelter, water, what else?" Morgan asked

"We need to build some sort of signal fire to alert any passing planes or ships of our presence." Hotch answered promptly.

"What about food?" asked Emily.

"That is not as much of a pressing issue. I'd like to get these three things taken care of first. Emily, you and Dave go looking for a fresh source of water. Spencer, I want you and JJ to work on getting fire. First build a base for a signal fire that will be easy to light and in a good place for planes passing by. Then build a small fire that we can keep up at camp for when it gets cold. Derek, you and I will work on securing a shelter. We don't know how long we will be stuck here, so we are going to hope for the best and prepare for the worst." Hotch ordered. With those words from their leader, the team all went off to do their respective tasks.

"Where do you think we should start?" JJ asked, startling Spencer who had been lost in thought.

"Well a signal fire should go somewhere that it will be easily seen from any point. I'm thinking someplace high up so the smoke isn't obstructed by anything." he replied.

"How about over there?" JJ asked, pointing to a place across the lagoon that seemed to be higher up than the rest of the island.

"That looks good. Let's head over there and we'll look for materials along the way." he affirmed.

They started the walk, first heading in towards the lagoon so they could easily pick their way around it. When they got to the edge of the blue waters, he could see that the lagoon was intermediate in size. The same limestone that he had found on his earlier excursion surrounded the body of water. He suspected it was being fed by an underwater stream coming from the ocean. He knelt down and peered into the crystal water. A few snails clung to the rocks around the edge and he noted that they could be a potential food source if they didn't find anything better. More information to store away in his "stranded on an island" folder.

"Do you think we can drink this?" JJ asked.

"No. It's being fed directly from the ocean so the salt is still existent. I wish it were that easy." he replied.

"So far, it seems like nothing out here is easy."

"You can say that again."

They made their way around the lagoon, picking up tinder and kindling along the way. The heat of the day continued and the shade of the little trees did little to stifle it. JJ pulled her hair back into a tight ponytail and wiped her brow. She rolled up the sleeves of her white blouse and rolled the legs of her tight black pants up a few times.

"So what do you know about making fires?" JJ inquired.

"The way I see it, we currently have two options. My first idea is to use this piece of glass that I found earlier. If we put some water in it, it will help to intensify and concentrate the beams of the sun. If that doesn't work, my second idea is to build a bow drill. That will take longer and it will end up using more of our energy so I'm hoping that the glass works." he said as he bent down to pick up a piece of wood that looked dry enough to use.

"How about here?" JJ said, pointing to a clear spot atop the little hill on the island that seemed to be the highest point.

"That looks good." he said. He set down the little bundle of branches and tinder that he had gathered on their walk and began constructing a tinder nest. The little ball of dry bark and fine fibers from different sticks. He set the bundle in the middle of the clearing and began constructing a pyramid around it. JJ handed him large sticks to use as weight bearing pillars. He filled in the space around them with medium sized branches, making sure to leave enough room for oxygen. When he was done he stepped back and admired their work. It looked like it would light easily and quickly and that was all they really needed it to do. He added some green branches to the construction to make lots of smoke.

"Alright lets head back to the home beach and see if we can get a fire going." he said. JJ nodded and wiped her brow again. The sun beat heavily upon them as they walked back.

When they arrived back at the beach, they could see Hotch and Morgan working hard on making a shelter. They picked a spot about 15 feet from where the others were working and started their set up. This time, JJ constructed the tinder bundle, having seen how Reid had done it the last time. Reid walked down to the water edge and filled the slight curvature of the glass with water. He carried it carefully over to where JJ was waiting. Seeing that she had made a bundle, he flashed her a smile and she returned one two times as bright. He built a little pyramid that he would place the bundle under when the time came. Holding the glass up to the sun, he found the place where a little beam of concentrated sun was resting. He adjusted it until the beam was placed in the center of the tinder bundle that JJ was holding in her hands. After about 40 seconds, black tendrils of smoke started to creep out from the bundle. JJ's breathing increased with anticipation. Abruptly the nest burst into flame and JJ hurriedly placed it underneath the pyramid. The flames spread from the bundle to the surrounding sticks. Spencer rocked back on his knees, letting out a breath he hadn't realised he was holding in. JJ fed the little fire more sticks and twigs.

The effort that he had put into doing this small task weighed heavily on him. He hadn't even been out here for one day and he was already starting to feel the effects. He was thirsty and hungry and tired. Mostly thirsty. He just hoped that Rossi and Emily were having as much luck as they were.

"Well this is going great." Rossi said sarcastically.

"Just be patient. There has gotta be water somewhere on this island. Look how green everything is." Prentiss replied. She respected the older agent but sometimes his relentless sarcasm got on her nerves. Especially now, when they had been searching for all of 35 minutes and he was already complaining. They were currently climbing over large limestone rocks, heading in what they hoped was the right direction. They had elected to climb over the rocks closer to the ocean rather than go inland towards the trees where animals might be lurking. Plus this way they were more likely to come across water. Before they had left, Reid had told them that there should be streams running from in the island to the ocean. She figured this way, they would be more likely to come across one of those streams.

Lodged between two of the rocks, she saw a slightly crushed plastic bottle.

"Rossi, look there." she nudged him and pointed at the bottle.

"Yes that is a piece of plastic. If you are trying to tell me that humanity is atrocious and we are polluting our oceans, I already know." he replied.

"No not that. Well, yes that is true. But I meant that we can use that to bring water back to the camp." she said.

"Oh well that's actually a great idea. Okay." he said as he reached down to grab the bottle. As they walked they found two more bottles. Now all they needed was the water. After about half an hour longer of walking, Rossi complaining all the way, they finally came to one of the streams that Reid had been talking about.

"Thank God" Rossi said as he rushed down to the little stream flowing over the smoothed out rocks. First, Prentiss went down to the place where the stream met the ocean and did her best to clean out the three bottles they had found. When she thought they were as clean as they could get, she went up a little further and filled each bottle as much as she could without them overflowing.

Rossi bent down to drink from the stream but she stopped him before he could.

"Remember what Reid said? The water may look clean but it could still have bacteria in it. We have to bring this back so we can boil it first." she scolded.

Rossi scowled but stopped himself from taking a drink. She handed him one of the full bottles and took the other two herself, knowing the older agent would need more hands to maneuver through the rocks. They started the journey back, knowing that all they would get for their efforts would be half a bottle of water each.

When they got back, the first thing Emily saw was the curling tendrils of black smoke that meant that Reid and JJ had managed to get a fire going. She sighed in relief knowing that that meant they would be able to purify the water. She questioned the durability of the plastic bottles but she knew it was the only container that they had. They walked over to the fire where Spencer and JJ where sitting and tending to the flames.

"We've got water!" Emily cried in triumph. The sudden noise caused JJ and Spencer to look up from the fire and wide smiles cracked across both of their faces.

"Thank goodness. I was beginning to think we would die of thirst." said JJ.

"Well we can't drink it yet apparently. I guess we have to wait for it to boil?" Rossi questioned.

"Yup. How far away was the stream?" Spencer asked.

"About an hours walk that way." Emily said pointing in the direction they had come from. Spencer nodded in response and went back to feeding the fire. Emily placed her two bottles next to the flames and hoped it wouldn't take too long for them to boil. Rossi did the same with his and sat down with an "umph" next to Spencer. Emily squatted across the fire from her three fellow agents. She pushed her dark hair away from her face and stared into the flames. Although she was sure she would be grateful for the fire later that night, right now it just added to the heat from the day. She scooted back and brushed her bangs away from her face. She looked over to where Hotch and Morgan were working. They seemed to have made significant progress. They had built a raised platform about 6 inches above the ground out of sturdy wood and they were currently constructing a roof of sorts over the top. They had the raft leaned against the back acting as a back wall to the formation.

She walked over to where they were working and said, "need any help?"

"Sure. Could you grab that branch over there?" Hotch asked pointing to a durable looking bough. She gladly complied and lifted the branch in her muscular arms. She handed it over to Hotch who in turn placed it on the roof of the the structure.

"Could you get those fronds over there?" Morgan asked, pointing to a pile of waxy green leaves.

"Sure. Where did you find these?" she asked curiously.

"There were some trees next to the lagoon. I thought the leaves might be useful." he responded. She nodded and grabbed the pile of leaves. She helped him to disperse the leaves around the roof.

"These should help keep us water proof if it ever rains again." Hotch said. They stepped back and looked at the shelter. It looked pretty durable and strong to Emily. She walked back over to the others around the fire and Derek and Hotch followed. The water was boiling rapidly now. The plastic bottles had bent and distorted a little, but they had done the job. She grabbed them and put them in the sand a few feet away, waiting for them to settle down. After a few minutes had passed, it looked like it would be cool enough to drink. She grabbed a bottle and raised it in cheers.

"To surviving our first day on the island, and near-future rescue!" she said.

"Cheers!" the others said in unison. She took a sip. Huh. Not bad.

 **Authors Note: Okay theres chapter two. Sorry it isn't longer. Again, let me know what you think. Feedback is appreciated!**


	3. The Dive

After drinking his portion of the water, Derek found himself looking out across the ocean. He had never been particularly good at swimming, but now the cool blue water looked fairly inviting. He decided that a swim would be refreshing, especially after working on the shelter for hours on end in the hot sun. Besides, maybe he would find something for them to eat while he was out there. He looked around to see what the others were doing, and if anyone might be interested in joining him. JJ was tending to the fire, feeding it small twiggs, Emily and Hotch were over at the lagoon, trying to find something to eat, Rossi had gone back to the stream to refill the bottles, and Reid was leaning against the shelter, seemingly lost in thought. He decided it was best not to bother them and to just go by himself.

He saw what looked to be a shelf or sandbar of some kind about 100 yards out and he decided that that would be his destination point. He stripped off his gray t-shirt and his jeans and waded into the water. It was shockingly cold but his body quickly got used to the temperature. The coral was rough but his feet were already calloused and he hardly noticed the discomfort. He kept walking until the icy water was up to his waist. He dove in and a wave of shock went through his body as the cold hit his torso. He bobbed back up above the water and started making long strokes with his arms, turning back and forth as he cut through the water.

After a while of this, he reached the little sandbar that he was swimming towards. He flung himself onto his back on the sand, still half in the water. Chest heaving from the quick burst of energy it had taken to make the swim, he lifted his head and looked back on the island. From far away, it looked almost like his friends were on some sort of vacation. Relaxing in the sun or playing games. But he knew the truth. He knew that they were trapped and fighting for their lives. He dropped his head back down into the soft sand and sighed. Two days ago if someone had told him this was where he was going to be, he would have thought they were crazy. Morgan had never really thought of himself as a survivalist. He was strong, yes, but what did he know about building shelters or scavenging for food? He had managed to keep a brave face so far, only confiding in Hotch right after they crashed. But he didn't know how long he could keep this up. He was hungry. He was used to having regular meals and it was taking a toll on his body to not have eaten something in so long. He heaved himself up so that he was sitting with his arms braced behind him.

He looked into the water, thinking that if there were any fish he may be able to build a fishing pole. There were some small colorful fish darting around deep in the water. They all moved in a hurry, like they were trying to get somewhere. Or away from something he thought with a shudder. But a further look around showed no predatory looking fish. Something in the water caused the sunlight to glint into his eyes and he squinted looking for the source. His eyes widened in surprise as he saw what it was. He was looking at the jet that he had been flying in just a day ago, submerged about 20 feet below the surface of the calm sea. It looked almost normal resting on a large shelf of coral, with only a few windows blown out and the tail end slightly blackened where it had been struck. His mind whirred with all the new possibilities this opened up. There could be precious resources down there.

He dove back into the water and started swimming at a quick pace. He was anxious to tell the team about his discovery. Something like this could change the whole course of their survival.

When he arrived back on the beach, he was slightly exhausted from the vigourous swim, but he managed to force his aching limbs to carry him over to the fire where most of the team was gathered. Hotch and Emily had joined JJ at the fire and so had Reid. Morgan could see Rossi making his way back over the limestone rocks carrying three full bottle of water.

"Enjoy your swim?" JJ asked half jokingly.

"Actually yes, but while I was out there I saw somethin'"

"Okay I appreciate the suspense, but now's not really the time. What was it?" Emily asked.

"The jet. It's out there about 20 feet down. I think we could dive down to it and get supplies."

"So the question becomes, is it worth expending the energy on?" Hotch questioned.

"Well, our jet had an emergency survival kit in it which I took the liberty of going through when I first joined the BAU. It had many things that could be useful to us, but most importantly, it had an ELT, which stands for emergency locator transmitter, that we could use to send out a distress signal on the 121.5 megahertz frequencies, which in turn will send out our location to the International Air Distress or the VHF Guard. Although, I'm not sure if it would have survived the crash." Reid said.

"Alright. I say we go for it. We'll take ten minutes to prepare and then we'll head out." Hotch stated.

"Go for what?" Rossi asked, having just joined the group.

"When Morgan went for his little swim, he saw our jet and he says it's within diving distance. We're going to go swim out to it and try and bring back supplies." JJ supplied.

"Well alrighty then. That's fine, just go ahead making important team decisions without me." Rossi grumbled, setting the water bottles in the sand a few feet away from the fire.

"Well do you object?" Hotch asked.

"No, actually I did a little swimming back when I was in highschool." Rossi conceded.

"Okay we'll go in ten minutes." Hotch said. With that, the team disbursed, all preparing themselves for the swim to the little island. Morgan sat down a few feet away from the fire, hoping to regain some of the warmth he had lost during his swim. He stretched his shoulder and closed his eyes. Emily was the only one still sitting around the fire with him.

"So, how long do you think you can hold your breath?" she asked, a slight smile playing at her lips.

"I don't really know," he chuckled, "I've never really counted."

"Well I used to try all the time. Back when I was a rebellious teenager and all that. My record was two minutes 21 seconds." she said.

"Damn Prentiss. I don't know much about breath holding but I think that's pretty good." he said

"Actually the average amount of time that a person can hold their breath for is 45 to 90 seconds, depending on physical health, and the record was set by Tom Sietas, a German freediver who held his breath underwater for 22 minutes and 22 seconds." Reid said as he sat down on the other side of Morgan.

"Well hello to you too, Pretty Boy." Morgan snorted. Reid just leaned back on his elbows and hung his head back, eyes screwed shut. Morgan stared into the flames, watching as they took shape and rearranged themselves again. Before he knew it, Hotch was calling them over to the water's edge. No one really knew if it had actually been ten minutes, but it was at least around that time. They all stood at the edge of the ocean. No one said anything about how embarrassing it was that they were all in their undergarments, but the red tints to their faces said it all. Hotch was first to wade into the water and the rest of the team followed. Morgan braced himself for another long swim. They all dove in, almost in unison. Morgan smiled to himself, thinking that they probably looked like some sort of swim team. Morgan noticed that Spencer reached the island before any of the rest of them. He cut through the water almost effortlessly and the kids speed surprised him. Next was JJ, then Hotch, then Emily, then Rossi, and lastly himself. He had known that he wasn't the best at swimming but it was still slightly shameful to be beaten by all of his team members. They unspokenly gathered in a circle to discuss what would come next.

"I'll go first," Hotch volunteered. He was met by no oppositions from the team. He was always putting himself before others, Morgan regarded. "Reid, where will I find the emergency supply kit?" he asked.

"It should be in the cabinet behind the pilot's chair in the cockpit." he replied.

"Okay. I'm going down." Hotch said. Morgan just hoped he was coming back up again.

Arron dove back into the icy water and hovered above where their craft was submerged, kicking his legs to keep him afloat. He ducked his head under the water and opened his eyes to test the visibility. The salty water stung his eyes slightly but they quickly adjusted and he was surprised at how clearly he could see. He came back up and took a deep breath in and let it out. On the next in breath, he dove underwater. Moving steadily downward, he reached the plane in about 15 seconds. He sought out the broken window he had selected when he was above the surface and swam inside, being careful not to cut himself on the jagged glass.

Looking around the plane was surreal to say the least. He had spent so much time here, going over cases, chatting with coworkers, sleeping. And now, small fish darted in between the seats where he used to sit and drink coffee. But there was no time to waste. He could already feel the pressure building in his head and he still had to get the kit. He swam up to the cockpit to reach the cabin but was startled by what he saw. An arm, yes that was definitely an arm. The pilot. He had forgotten all about him in the events of the day. He fought the urge to throw up as a small fish nibbled at the flesh of the bloated arm. Time was running out. He needed to get that kit, there was no time to focus on the pilot. He wrenched his eyes away from that arm and locked them on a small cabinet behind the chair. He grabbed on to the handle that was attached to the door of the cabin, but it wouldn't budge. It was only then that he saw the small lock that was underneath the handle. _Damn it_. There was no time to search for a key, he had to get out of there. His head was starting to feel light and his eyelids were getting heavy. He shot out of the cockpit as fast as he could and escaped out of the window. Kicking as hard as he could up towards the light with his powerful legs, he swam. _Almost there,_ he thought. When his head burst up from the water, he heard cheering from his team, even though he had nothing in his hands. He heaved himself back up onto the sand, breathing heavily.

"Did you find the emergency kit?" Rossi asked.

"Locked." he gasped out, still winded. Looks of disappointment flashed across their faces and Hotch felt humiliated that he hadn't been able to provide for his team.

"I think I might know where the key is," Reid piped up "but I don't know if you're going to be able to get to it."

"Where is it?" Hotch said, turning his head to face the young doctor.

"Well," Reid began uncomfortably, "the pilot always wore this necklace that had a key on it. I had always wondered what it went to but.." he trailed off. Hotch sighed. Leave it to Reid to notice a detail like that.

"I'm going back down." he said as he pushed himself off the sand.

"No way man, you're spent." Morgan said.

"Let me go. I'm the best equipped because I've gone once before." Hotch argued. No one could really come up with a debate for him not to go so they just stared solemnly. After a few minutes of resting, he got up and plunged back into the frigid water. He took a deep breath and dove. This time when he got into the plane, he wasted no time looking around and headed straight to the cockpit. He braced himself for seeing the body of the pilot. He had seen plenty of dead bodies before, but this time seemed different. This man had risked his life to save theirs. He swam around so he was facing the front of the pilot's chair and he couldn't stop himself from gasping and letting out a stream of bubbles. The pilot's face was just as bloated as the rest of him. His blue eyes open and staring right at Hotch. There was some abrasion on his cheek and Hotch found out why. A small blue fish came and bit at the skin of his face. Hotch again swallowed down his vomit and reached for the place around his neck where he knew that the key would be. His searching hands found their target and he carefully pulled the chain off from around the man's neck. He took the small silver key in his trembling fingers and returned to the cabinet behind the chair. He fumbled with the lock for a second until he heard the telltale click. The door swung open and he wasted no time grabbing the red duffle bag that held the supplies that he and his team needed. Clutching the precious bag close to his chest, he swam out the same window he had used to get in and kicked upwards. This time when he burst above the water, he held the bag above his head so his teammates would clearly see it. The cheers were louder this time. He threw himself onto the sand and laid his head back, one arm still protectively clutched across the red bag.

After about a minute of the teams congratulations while he sat breathing heavily, he sat up and placed the bag in the middle of the circle that had once again gathered. He carefully unzipped it and peered inside. A small orange box with a few cables coming off of it rested on top.

"That's the ELT." Spencer said, a little bit of excitement creeping into his voice. Reid reached into the bag and delicately picked up the ELT. He flipped a small switch on the bottom and his face immediately fell when nothing happened.

"I'm going to guess that means it's broken?" Rossi questioned. Spencer only nodded his affirmation, clearly upset. Hotch reached back into the bag and pulled out 3 aluminum emergency blankets in plastic bags. He continued to pull things out of the bag and their list of items kept growing and it now included, a roll of silver duct tape, a mid sized knife and sheath, a coil of rope, a small roll of bandages, a pair of miniature scissors, four metal water bottles, a small fishing kit, and a box of 12 soggy granola bars. It wasn't much, but Hotch knew that some of these things could mean the difference between life and death.

"Okay I want to go next. I have an idea." JJ said. Hotch knew that the courageous and fiery woman would be able to take care of herself so neither he nor anyone else objected.

Jennifer Jareau stood where the sand met the water on their little island and took a deep breath. She plunged into the water and felt it's icy grip overtake her. The shock of the cold water soon wore off and she suspended herself above the plane. _1, 2, 3!_ She counted for herself as she dove down on three. She squinted her eyes against the salty water, but the sting soon went away and she was amazed at the clarity of the water. She quickly reached the body of the plane and found herself reaching out to touch the smooth white metal. She worked her way over to the nearest open window and carefully avoided the shards of glass still clinging to the rim.

When she was inside the plane, she was surprised to see how much life had already taken over. She could already feel her lungs starting to punish her so she moved quickly to her destination. She moved over to where she had been sitting just one day ago and reached up above to the overhead bin. A small smile crossed her face as her hand touched the familiar fabric of her go bag. She grabbed her prize and instantaneously used the seat to propel herself towards the open window and then she was out of the plane. She put the strap of the bag over her shoulder so she could freely use her arms to help thrust herself upwards. The extra weight of the bag did almost nothing to slow her down in her upward swim. She burst above the water, immediately taking a breath of fresh air. She washed back up onto the little beach and sighed, her blonde hair plastered to the sides of her face. Excited at the possibility of wearing something other than her uncomfortable work clothes, she opened the bag and saw that all of its contents were intact.

"That's not a half bad ideas" Rossi said, "I think I'm gonna go get my own."

"Let's see that, 'I swam a little bit in highschool'" Morgan teased.

"Oh I'll show you." the older profiler said back. She watched as his gray hair disappear beneath the slight waves of the sea. Rossi returned about one and a half minutes later, carrying not only his own go bag, but Hotch's as well.

"How's that for 'swam a little bit in high school'?" Rossi heaved, clearly out of breath.

"Alright, alright, not bad," Morgan conceded, "but I'm gonna do better." he said with a grin, diving in without any hesitation. JJ rolled her eyes when she realised that this had become a competition.

"I was wondering when the testosterone was going to come into play." Emily said.

"I knew it couldn't have been long." JJ laughed. When she was joking like this, she could almost forget that they were trapped on an island with no means of escape. Before JJ could get too deep into her thinking, Morgan resurfaced, carrying the bags of Reid, Emily, and himself.

"Beat that." he breathed out, evidently drained.

"Easy guys. Remember to save enough energy for the swim back." Emily said.

"Hey Em, wanna go down with me? I don't see why we can't go two at a time." JJ asked.

"Sure. I think it's my turn anyway." she replied. The two stood together at the edge of the water and disappeared beneath the ocean's surface. JJ kicked her way down and saw Emily was doing the same. This time when they reached the plane. JJ went int with no hesitation and Emily followed her lead. In the plane, JJ saw Emily pick up a mug, obviously thinking it would be good for getting water. JJ searched around looking for something useful, when her eyes fell on a pair of dark sunglasses. _Those are Morgans!_ She thought. She knew he would be eternally grateful if she got them for him so she grabbed them and nodded at Emily, signaling that she was ready to leave.

When they resurfaced, Emily added her mug to the growing pile of salvages, and JJ handed the sunglasses to Derek.

"Jayje, you didn't." he exclaimed.

"Oh but I did." she said

"I am forever in debt to you. You don't even know." he nearly yelled.

"Don't mention it" she said smugly. He promptly slid the shades on and a grin broke across his face.

"Alright," Reid said, "It's my turn." no one said anything but they were all obviously uncomfortable with the idea of their youngest member making the trip down. They all knew he was capable of taking care of himself, but that didn't stop the concern they felt. They were all protective of him, even though he had proved himself multiple times.

"Spence.." she trailed off, "You really don't have to."

"I want to. Everyone else had contributed and I'm not going to be the only one that hasn't." he said definitely.

"Okay, just be careful." JJ said.

Spencer hated when they looked at him like that. Like he was a child who couldn't take care of himself. He'd show them. He had an idea of what he was looking for but he didn't know exactly where it would be. He'd just have to do some searching. He took a breath in and plunged below the water. He managed to propel himself quickly down to where the plane was. He had always been a fast swimmer. His mother used to take him to their local swimming pool and let him do laps, sometimes for hours. She used to say he was her little fish. He pushed the memory aside as he swam into the jet through the window, managing to avoid the sharp glass.

Once inside the plane, he made his way to the cockpit where he was quite sure what he was looking for would be. There were multiple wooden cabinets around where the pilot was seated. He averted his eyes from the bloated man and began opening the cupboards. They were all unsuccessful. Time was running out and the panic was starting to set in. He needed to bring something important back or else they would keep seeing him as a kid. His face set with determination and he opened up the last cupboard in the row. A small orange cylinder floated around near the back. _Yes!_ He thought as he reached in, grasping around fiercely. His fingertips brushed up against the orange plastic but he couldn't quite grab it. Straining even further, he reached his whole arm into the deep cupboard. Finally, his fingers encircled it and he clamped down.

Pulling his arm out rapidly and turning around, he scooted out of the cockpit. His lungs were now desperate for air and a deep burning sensation filled them. He knew he needed oxygen soon or he would pass out. He nearly flung himself out the window, so frantic to escape that he didn't even notice when the glass still stuck to window cut deeply into his stomach. The pain didn't register as he kicked wildly up to the surface. When his head sprung up above the surface, he gasped down the air. He crawled on to the beach and lay on his back, panting for air. The team gathered around him and Emily was the first to notice the cylinder in his hand.

"What is that?" she asked.

"Flare." he managed to get out inbetween pants.

"Nice grab pretty boy." Morgan said, clapping him on the shoulder.

"Now we don't have to worry about the signal fire so much. Nice job Spence." JJ said. Spencer stood up and placed the precious flare into the pile of provisions. He turned around and faced the group, a small smile on his face.

"Hey, what the hell happened to you?" Morgan asked. Reid confused, looked down. It was only then that he saw the dark red dripping down his stomach.

 **Author's Note: Okay so I hope that answers the question of who gets hurt. Sorry about some of the weird spacing, I'm still trying to figure this out ;)**


	4. not gonna eat snails

David Rossi sank to the ground in defeat. They hadn't even been on this island for one whole day and already it was kicking their asses. When one problem was solved, another one seemed to crop up; the newest one being the six inch cut on Spencer's torso running from the base of his stomach to his ribs. It was a good thing they had those bandages because Rossi was pretty sure they were going to need them. The cut didn't look too deep but he knew that the real risk was of infection.

"Don't worry guys, it's not as bad as it looks. I must have cut myself on some of the glass that was still around the window of the plane. As long as I keep it covered the risk of infection is significantly lowered and now that we have some bandages that won't be too hard to do." Spencer said.

"Alright, let's make the swim back to the beach and then we can work on repairing your injury." Hotch said somberly. Rossi caught JJ exchange a worried glance with Morgan who in turn put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. He could tell the woman was worried about her friend. He was a little bit worried about the younger man himself. Something as small as a cut out here could turn into something detrimental later. He shook his head, deciding not to dwell on negative thoughts like that, and stood up, preparing himself for the swim back. Although it was true that he did do a little bit of swimming in high school, it was also true that a little bit of swimming translated to three days of practice with his high school team and then quitting when he tired of it. But he had managed to bring up not only his own duffle bag from the plane, but also the bag of the teams unit chief. So really maybe those three practices had done him some good.

They divided up the new items and each took a bag to carry, being careful not to leave anything behind (you never know when something might be of value). When everyone had gathered their share of the new assets, they stood at the edge of the water and went in one by one. Rossi himself took the back with Hotch taking the lead, and that is how they swam all the way back, in a long line, trying not to let anyone fall too far behind or get too far ahead. They weren't too keen on being separated at the moment.

Rossi breathed a sigh of relief when he finally washed up on the sand. He was getting kind of used to the strain long swims put on his body, but there had also been the prevalent fear that the blood from Spencer's cut would attract a shark. This time they had gotten lucky and no such thing occurred. After a few minutes of relaxing, the team disbursed to do their respective jobs. There was always something that needed doing here. First everyone had dried off as best as they could and then gotten dressed in the leisure clothing they had packed for their off time in Mexico. Rossi put on a blue and white Hawaiian shirt and some khaki they were all fully clothed, Hotch had taken control of managing the supplies and was working with Emily to organize them, JJ was feeding the fire, trying not to let it die from their long absence, Morgan had gone to fill the metal water bottles with water from the stream, the plastic ones having been too warped to be functional, and Reid was attempting to wrap a bandage around himself. Rossi eventually decided that he would be most useful helping Hotch and Emily with categorizing the materials.

The two were over near the shelter area and it looked like they were trying to decide where to put their supply pile. Hotch was wearing a plain grey t-shirt and a pair of cargo shorts. It was odd to see his boss in such casual attire, and it looked bizarre to see him without a tie. Emily was wearing a short sleeve button up and casual jean shorts. This informal dress was slightly less unusual on her but it was still different from her customary pantsuit.

"You guys need any help?" he asked them.

"Actually, we have this covered, but it looks like Reid could use some help." Hotch said with a slight smirk. Rossi looked over to where Reid sat perched on a rock, trying and failing to wrap the bandages around himself. Rossi sighed and gave Hotch a half hearted salute and trudged over to where the young man sat fumbling with the bandages.

"Looks like you could use some help?" Rossi questioned. Spencer fumbled with the bandage tape a moment longer and then dropped his arms in defeat.

"Yeah, I guess. I already cleaned it in the lagoon as best I could with the salt water. Did you know that although many people believe salt water to be associated with healing, in reality it doesn't do much. In some cases it can act as a bacteriostatic agent, which means that it will prevent bacteria from reproducing but it won't necessarily kill them otherwise. Also-" Spencer rambled until Rossi cut him off.

"Okay I get it, just give me the bandages." Rossi said, exasperated. Reid looked down and dug his toes into the course sand and handed over the roll of bandages. Rossi took the end of the adhesive wrap and pulled it until there was a good long portion of it undone. He then proceeded to wrap it around the younger man's stomach horizontally so that it covered the whole cut. When he had finished, he stepped back to admire his handiwork. Reid looked up at him, squinting against the sun, and flashed him a thumbs up. Rossi nodded his head, feeling accomplished.

He looked out over the ocean and noticed that the sun had started to paint the sky with red and orange. An island sunset. It was beautiful if he didn't think about it too much. He sat down in the sand close to the water, but not close enough that the waves would come up and lap at his feet. He leaned back and braced himself on his arms. The last heat of the sun still lingered on his skin and in that moment he felt almost at ease.

But the calm didn't last for long. About five minutes after he sat down, Rossi was startled to attention by the commanding voice of his unit chief.

"Team meeting at the shelter in one minute." Hotch called. Rossi just hoped that whatever it was that Hotch had to tell them was good news. He didn't think he could handle any more negative surprises at this point. Rubbing his brow with his thumb and forefinger, he gradually got up to his feet and made his way over to the shelter. By the time he got there, the rest of the team was already gathered and they seemed to be in an unusually cheery mood. And then he saw the still slightly damp box of granola bars placed in the middle of the lopsided circle they had formed. Just looking at the food made his stomach growled as he remembered how long it had been since he had last eaten.

"Alright, I say we each get half a bar. We need to be sparing with this resource because it it so limited." Hotch suggested.

"Are you sure we can't do a full one each man?" Morgan asked. "We worked so hard today. I think the least we deserve is a granola bar."

"No, Hotch is right. I think we should make these last as long as possible." Emily contributed.

"I agree." JJ added in.

"Me too." said Reid.

"What about you Dave?" Hotch addressed him.

"Well obviously I want to agree with Morgan. But I believe that we need to be sparing with our food." he said.

"Alright, I can divide three of the bars evenly in half and everybody can take one. We don't have to be so conservative with the water though so take as much of that as you want. There is some purifying over by the fire as we speak." Hotch said, looking at each of them as he spoke. Everyone nodded their agreement, Morgan having given in when no one else agreed with him. Hotch carefully unwrapped the three bars and placed them on top of their shiny packages. Although the box had gotten wet through the fabric of the duffle bag, the contents had remained undamaged and the granola bars actually looked very appetizing to Rossi. He licked his lips in anticipation as Hotch used the knife they had gotten from the kit to cut each of the bars evenly in half. Everyone reached out and took their piece, being careful not to drop even a crumb.

The granola bar was just as you would expect a protein packed, mandatory for planes to carry, and meant for survival food item to taste. It was pretty bland and chunky, but after he had finished it, he did feel slightly more full.

"well, it wasn't what I'm _used_ to eating for dinner, but it wasn't the worst thing either." Rossi commented.

"It tastes kind of like that time Spencer tried to cook." Emily said with a slight laugh.

"In my defence, I did arrive late and I think I missed some of the fundamentals." Spencer said.

"You truly were a disgrace to Italian cuisine." he said with a shake of his head. After a while longer of amusing banter, they fell into a comfortable silence. The sun had now disappeared completely over the horizon and Rossi could already feel the prickle of the the cool night air on his skin.

"Do you think we can break out those emergency blankets? It's already getting chilly and my old bones can't handle it." he said.

"Sure." Hotch said as he got up and reached under the shelter to pull out the three packages filled with the heat-reflective plastic material. He tore open one of the packages and shook out the blanket to its full size. It was big enough for two people with room to spare so the blanket sharing wasn't going to be too awkward.

"Alright team. I'm ordering mandatory sleep right now. We all are going to need our rest if we want to keep up our strength." Hotch mandated. He was met with a few groans and a few eye rolls but Rossi knew the reason that Hotch had made the order. If they wanted to get things done around here, they were going to need to have the energy and the price they had to pay for energy was sleep.

The new shelter that Hotch and Morgan had built was much more comfortable than the ground that they had all slept on last time. Rossi was sharing a blanket with Hotch on the left end of the structure. They both faced away from each other, but were secretly appreciative of the others body heat. Emily and JJ shared another blanket and they occupied the space in the middle of the shelter. They slept facing towards each other, each one finding comfort in the closeness of the other. Reid and Morgan shared a blanket on the other side of the shelter. This had come with some mild protesting from Morgan but he had soon given that up when he realised how stupid it was that he was arguing about that when they were literally all stranded on an island.

Rossi tossed and turned a little bit before he was finally able to fall into a fitful sleep. When he dreamed, he dreamed of lightning storms and orange rafts. Of sunken planes and soggy granola bars. And through all of his dreams there was something else there. Something that chased him through the many different dreams. He couldn't quite tell what it was but it kept getting closer and closer.

When Emily woke up the next morning, the first thing she saw was JJ. Her blonde hair fell over her peacefully closed eyes and a strand of it was caught on her lip. Emily rolled over onto her other side and saw the still sleeping form of Rossi's back. She blinked the sleep out of her eyes and sat up carefully so as not to disturb those around her. She saw that Hotch, Morgan, and Reid had all already gotten up and were sitting around the embers of the fire. Morgan was poking at them with a stick, trying to revive any of the flame that still might be there. Hotch added a small pile of tinder and it almost instantly caught fire. They all added sticks and twigs to the pile until there was a working foundation that could support itself. She got up from where she was sitting on the edge of the shelter and ran her fingers through her slightly tangled hair. She made a mental note to ask JJ later if she had a comb.

"Mornin'" Morgan greeted groggily.

"I don't think I have ever wanted coffee more in my life than right now." Spencer complained.

"I second that." she agreed as she sat down in the sand around the small fire. She looked out at the ocean and saw the sun peeking out over the water, sending beams of light reflecting on the ocean's glass-like surface. Although she had slept surprisingly well last night, she felt the fatigue everywhere, and she was sure that the flat hard floor of their shelter was not doing anything good for her back.

"I think I'm gonna try out that fishing kit today." Morgan said.

"Have you ever held a fishing pole in your entire life?" Hotch asked.

"Actually yeah. I used to go fishing all the time with my sisters." Morgan defended himself.

"Well I for one hope you're good at it. We could all use some fish thats for sure. Those granola bars are not going to last forever." she said.

"'I'll do my best but no promises." Morgan said with a smile.

"Are there any other ideas for ways of getting food in case our resident fisherman has no luck?" Emily asked the group.

"Well, I do have one idea, but you're not going to like it." Spencer said.

"How do you know I won't like it unless you tell me?" she asked.

"I saw some snails in the lagoon and-" he started.

"Okay I don't like it. Let's say snails are a last resort." she said

"Actually, snails are commonly eaten in many places like France, Spain, and Portugal." Reid countered.

"Well we aren't in France, are we?" she said. He had no response for her so he just looked at the ground. The dark circles under his eyes did not escape her notice but she decided not to comment on them. She knew that none of them were really getting good sleep out here anyway. Well, maybe with the exceptions of JJ and Rossi. They seemed to be pretty comfortable over there. She envied their ability to sleep through the harsh invasion of the sun. Back at home, she had always needed darkened shades if she had wanted to sleep past sunrise (which her job normally didn't allow for anyway).

An idea came to Emily shortly after the other two of her teammates had woken up and they had all had a breakfast of four swigs of water. She had decided to make a rescue signal. She figured a big SOS made out of the white rocks would stand out nicely in the sand. First she found a nice patch of smooth sand that she though would stand out from anyone who may be flying over the island. The next step was to find recruits. She was going to ask Morgan but remembered that he was doing his little fishing thing so she went to find JJ.

"Hey JJ, you busy?" she asked the woman when she found her at the edge of the lagoon.

"Actually yeah I kind of am. I'm looking for anything we might be able to eat out here. I learned about edible plants in the girl scouts. Sorry." she replied.

"Okay, good luck scout." she said with a smile and went off to look for someone else. She found Hotch standing near the fire looking slightly lost. She knew that of he didn't have something to do he would probably become anxious so she decided to ask him.

"Hey Hotch, have time to help me out with something?" she asked him. He startled slightly, apparently not having seen her approach.

"Sure. What do you need?' he asked willingly.

"I'm planning on making a rescue signal with some of these white rocks. I could use some help?" she subtly asked.

"Of coarse." he said. As he moved into action, some of the tension in his face visibly released. She knew that he didn't like feeling useless and that situations that he couldn't control made him nervous. And this situation that they were in was probably the hardest thing to control. So helping him relieve some of that anxiety by giving him something to do made her feel good.

They worked tirelessly for hours, bringing the white rocks in arm loads over to where they were working and carefully arranging them into the letters SOS. When they were finished, the work paid off and they ended up with a blaring signal that she was sure a plane couldn't miss. The white of the limestone stood out against the grainy brown sand. She decided to take a little break from working and go sit by the fire. Even though she was sweating from the effort and the sun, a slight chill ran through her body. She didn't know how much longer she and her team could keep this up. Every day was a fight for their lives, but where they ever going to get a break?

 **Author's Note: Okay so I don't really like this chapter.** **Idk it just seems boring, even though it took me forever to update. I had a lot going on in life and this week seemed more like a month. Gosh. Anyway, sorry for the wait and I hope you enjoyed more than I did.**

 **P.S. kudos to** **anyone who can come up with a good name for this chapter because I sure as hell can't**


	5. Long Nights

**Author's Note:** Okay so thank you to everyone who suggested a title for the last chapter, they were all wonderful. I have to say I did like the name, "not gonna eat snails" the best so Kudos to AZCatmom and thank you all again for the suggestions. Also I've seen other people do this and I'm not even sure if I have to but, **Disclaimer** : I don't own Criminal Minds or any of its characters!

Jennifer Jareau sat down at the edge of the dwindling fire in frustration. Her search for edible plants around the lagoon hadn't yielded anything, and in her book that was a failure. She wasn't used to failing at things. Most of her life was a series of successes and wins but this island seemed to keep beating her. She wondered what Henry and Will were doing right now. They were probably aware of her absence at this point. She hoped they weren't too worried. She hated making other people worried. Before she could delve too deeply into her own thinking, the approaching figure of Rossi jarred her back to reality. He was coming from the direction of the stream and carried the four water bottles with him. JJ could see the sweat dripping down his face even from her place across from the withering flame.

"Why couldn't that stream have been any closer to where we landed?" Rossi asked as he set the water bottles down a ways away from the fire, pushing them into the sand so that they wouldn't fall over.

"A cruel twist of fate?" she offered, getting up to her feet.

"Try evil." he replied.

"I'm gonna go get some more firewood so we can purify that water. I could use an extra hand if you're not too tired?" she asked. She didn't want to bother the older profiler but she really didn't feel like being alone right now. Besides, he didn't look like he would be in the mood to sit near hot embers at the moment, she noted as she saw the sweat drip off of his face.

"It's better than doing nothing. You know what they say about idle hands." he said as he wiped his brow. She smiled and pushed herself up into a standing position and brushed the few traces of sand that had managed to cling to her legs back onto the ground where they were lost in the seemingly infinite other grains.

The two walked off towards the lagoon with JJ leading the way. The ground around the lagoon was littered with dried twigs that would be perfect for burning. Since the pickings were far from scarce JJ was able to be selective. She liked to think that the fire had become sort of her "thing." She liked tending to it and in a way, she guessed it was like a surrogate for Henry. The fire always needed maintaining and she liked the consistency it gave her to need to feed it every three hours or so.

"So, how's island life treating you?" Rossi asked, jarring her out of her thoughts.

"I mean, honestly it could be worse." she said sardonically.

"Please don't test fate." he sighed. They continued the rest of their chore in silence, each one left to reflect. When their arms were full, they mutually decided to head back to the main beach, but the sight they saw when they got back made JJ drop her load.

"STOP" she yelled as she ran down to the fire where Hotch and Morgan were, drinking from the bottle of unpurified water.

"Whatsa matter Jayje? It's not like we have cooties." Morgan smirked, obviously not realising his mistake.

"That water hasn't been purified yet! The fire wasn't hot enough!" Rossi said with eyes wide, having joined them by the fire a second ago. JJ watched as the realisation settled over both of their faces at the same time. Morgan's jaw dropped and his eyebrows shot up. Although Hotch had less of a noticeable reaction, JJ could tell he was upset form the slight furrowing of his brow.

"Okay let's remain calm. Does anyone remember what Spencer said would happen if we drank unpurified water?" Hotch said, putting his hands out in front of him as if to steady himself.

"Many problems can stem from drinking unpurified water, some more severe than others, ranging from urgent diseases like Typhoid or Cholera to more short term symptoms like gastrointestinal or stomach sickness like nausea or vomiting. In other cases, there is no effect at all. Why do you ask?" Spencer said, coming up behind JJ.

"These two fools drank the water before it had a chance to purify." Rossi said in an almost accusatory tone.

"Well we weren't the ones to put the impure bottle in the place where we normally put the pure ones, were we." Morgan said, advancing on Rossi angrily.

"Okay everyone just calm down." JJ said, stepping between them. The last thing they needed right now was a fight so she was going to do everything she could to stop one from happening.

"JJ is right. We both made mistakes but we can't blame each other." Hotch said

"What's going on guys?" Emily asked, having just joined the group seeing the commotion.

" Morgan and I accidentally drank some water that hadn't been purified." Hotch said, face looking more grim than usual.

"Oh my God. How are you feeling?" she asked, concern flooding her deep brown eyes.

"I actually feel fine." he responded and Morgan nodded in agreement.

"That doesn't mean that symptoms won't appear later on." Spencer said. JJ shot him a look and he said, "sorry that probably wasn't the best thing to say right now."

"I say we wait this out, take it easy for the rest of the afternoon." she said. The team only nodded in response and she could tell there was still some tension left between them. She sat down in the sand and picked up a handful, letting the grains sift through her fingers leaving behind only the larger rocks. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back so it was resting just above the sand. She thought that everyone had left and gone off to be with their own thinking but then she felt the presence of someone sitting beside her. She opened her eyes and saw Morgan staring blankly into the fire and feeding it the sticks that she had dropped further up the beach. By now, the flames had grabbed ahold of the fresh sustenance and had begun to devour it. He looked seemingly unfazed by the previous events as he reached into the back pocket of his cargo shorts and pulling out the dark sunglasses. He put them on and flashed her a smile. She knew that he was showing her his gratitude for having retrieved them earlier, but she just couldn't seem to reflect his casual attitude.

"Aren't you afraid?" she asked him, trying to look through the dark glasses into his eyes.

"Of what, cooties? I thought we went over this already" he joked, but she could see the slightly more solemn look on his face.

"Morgan, I'm being serious." she said, a little emotion creeping into her voice. If something like this had happened off of the island, it wouldn't have been any cause for worry. But out here, God knows how far from the nearest hospital, it could turn into a big deal.

Having sensed the emotion in her voice he leaned forward and said, "Hey listen. It's gonna be alright. I bet Hotch and I are gonna be fine. If not, it can't be too long before they find us. I bet Garcia is searching madly for us right now. If anyone can find us it's my baby girl." he said. JJ laughed at the image of Garcia typing furiously at her computer, doing whatever it is that she does. She wiped her eyes, not even realising that tears had begun to fall.

"Thanks Morgan" she said, leaning over slightly to bump against his arm.

"No problem Jayje." he replied, bumping back. The air had started to cool down, and judging form the position of the sun it was about 5:30. Her stomach growled, making her remember Morgan's promise of fish.

"Hey, whatever happened to your little fishing excursion?" she asked.

"I couldn't get any to bite. But I think if I went back out to the shelf on the reef I could get some." he said defensively.

"Well if you don't hurry up, Spencer _is_ going to make us all eat snails." she said

"May it never come to that." he said with a laugh.

Before either of them could say anything else, they were interrupted by a sound that JJ was all too familiar with from being the mother of a young child. _Oh no,_ she thought. She turned around to look in the direction of the sound and saw what she was afraid of seeing; Hotch, bent over with one hand braced on a tree.

"Shit." Morgan said. They both got up and raced to their boss's side and she could see that Reid, Prentiss, and Rossi were all doing the same thing.

"Oh, Hotch…" she said sympathetically. His pale face accented the sweat that was dripping down his nose and his eyes were screwed shut in pain. One hand was still bracing the tree and the other was curled protectively around his stomach. His eyes flew open and he looked around wildly for a moment before landing on her. He started breathing harder and he seemed to go into panic mode.

"It's me Hotch, its JJ." she said. He seemed to calm down at her words and nod his head slightly.

"Hey guys, a little help?" she said as she slung one of his arms around her shoulder. Rossi quickly took the other arm and they practically dragged him over to the shelter. She sat on the edge and laid his head in her lap, the rest of him horizontal on the shelter. Emily grabbed one of the reflective blankets and draped it over him, having noticed that he was shaking. JJ pressed her hand to his forehead and felt the heat that could only come with a fever.

"It's actually probably a good thing that he threw up. It means that this is probably just a one night thing that should be over by the morning." Reid supplied. No one replied. Hotch sat upright suddenly, his eyes wide. Morgan was prepared and he quickly handed him the empty plastic container that the medical kit had come in. Having thrown up the few contents of his stomach earlier, he now only painfully dry heaved. JJ rubbed his back as he bent over, the practice of being a mother showing up in the gentleness of her touch.

"How are you feeling Morgan?" Emily asked.

"I feel fine. Got any explanation for that Dr. Reid?" he asked.

"Well first of all, I'm not actually a medical doctor, and second, I already told you, sometimes there is no effect. I guess you just got lucky. Either that or the symptoms haven't started showing yet because you have something more severe." he replied.

"Yeah," Morgan scoffed, "lucky."

The rest of the night the team kept turns staying up with Hotch. JJ took the first turn because his head was already on her lap. His eyes were closed in a fitful sleep but she knew it wouldn't last long. Seeing her unit chief so vulnerable was frightening. He was normally so strong and unbothered by things. It really just went to show how none of them were safe. He stirred and shifted, probably being tormented by a feverish dream and she pushed his sweat soaked hair off his forehead. This was going to be a long night.

Quantico, Virginia

Penelope Garcia was an absolute mess. _Keep it together_ , she told herself. But it was hard, so very hard with her precious team missing. She had gotten the call only yesterday. It had woken her up in the middle of the night. When she had seen that the call was coming from Erin Strauss, the teams section chief, she knew it couldn't have been good news. She hadn't known that the team had never arrived back safely because before they had left Mexico Hotch had told her that she could go home. So of course she had. She loved the team but when she could get some time off, she took advantage of it.

As soon as she had heard the news, she had stumbled out of bed and gone straight to the BAU, not even bothering to get out of her pajamas. The tears coming out of her eyes had blurred her vision as she desperately tried to get the last known GPS location of the plane. _Maybe one of them managed to get the ELT working,_ she thought. But she couldn't get anything that would be useful. She had managed to contact the coast guard officials who were working on finding her beloved team.

"Do you have any idea where they could be?" she had asked them desperately.

"We do have some idea.." One of them trailed off.

"At the bottom of the ocean." another one whispered cruelly. She had brought her hands to her face at that point, unable to hold herself together.

"Well, we don't know that for sure," the other one said, elbowing his partner, "the original course of their flight wouldn't have put them over any islands but we have reason to believe the pilot altered the course in an attempt to avoid the storm." he explained.

"That obviously didn't work out too well." said the meaner man. Penelope couldn't hold back at that point, and she had fully lunged at him, tackling him and bringing him to the ground. The kinder man had pulled her up and off of the other man and she melted in his arms, a sobbing mess.

"Get out of here, Ken." the nicer man barked, and the other man on the floor had gotten up and scurried frightened out of the door. "I'm Blake, and I promise that I will do everything I can to find your friends or at least bring you some closure." he said. She had only nodded and hugged him in reply.

Now she sat in her office chair, which normally she would have enjoyed spinning around in, but now she sat still, and waited for a call from Blake. He had told her before she had left that he would call her if he had any news. It killed her to sit around doing nothing, but there really wasn't anything she could do. This was _not_ her area of expertise. She leaned her head back in the chair and ran her hair through her uncombed hair. She hadn't been taking such good care of herself lately. But how could she be expected to focus on something so trivial as hygiene when her family was missing?

The ringing of her phone startled her back to reality and she picked it up and pressed it close to her ear like it was the most precious thing in the world.

"Hey chocolate thunder, it's your friendly neighborhood technical analyst. How.." she started to say but then remembered.

"Excuse me?" said a very confused Blake.

"Sorry.. It's a habit," she said tears brimming in her eyes, "so what's the news?" she asked, cradling the phone.

"Well, it's not great. The storm that cause your friends plane to crash is making it so we can't fly out any search planes. All flights are being put off for at least two days." he said heavily.

"What? Isn't there people whose job it is to do that kind of thing?" she asked in disbelief.

"It's just too dangerous. We can't risk sending our people out there."

"Please, I'm begging you." she said, close to tears for what felt like the hundredth time in the last few days.

"I'm sorry Ms. Garcia, it's just not worth the lives of our people to go out looking for your friends who are probably already dead. Garcia let out a ragged sob after hearing his harsh words.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like th-" he went to say but she put the phone back in it's cradle before he could get anything else out. She put her head in her hands and leaned over her desk. _Oh my god_ , she thought. _I can't believe this is actually happening._

After about an hour of crying and letting out all of her emotions, an idea came to her. She wasn't going to keep sitting back and letting her friends fates be determined by the some people who weren't even willing to help. She knew that they were still out there and alive. She could _feel_ it. She was going to take things into her own hands.

"Okay Penelope. The lives of all of your friends may depend on what you do next. No pressure." she said to herself as she stretched her knuckles and began typing.

 **Author's Note:** So that is chapter five. I legit ate so many Doritos while writing this, like you guys have no idea. Anyways, I don't know if anyone even reads the authors note, but I have a question. Are the lengths of my chapters good? Like, too long, too short, just right? It would be great if you guys could let me know! Thanks!


	6. The Snake

**Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or any of its characters**

When Morgan woke up the next morning, it was to the vehement grumbling in his stomach. He was slightly confused about where he was at first; some sort of hard foreign surface. Then he remembered. He looked up suddenly searching for Hotch, his eyes still adjusting to the morning light. The BAU unit chief had stopped vomiting at about one A.M. and had fallen into a disturbed sleep. Morgan had been the one watching him when he had finally settled down so he knew. He saw him, arm slung lazily over the side of the shelter, laying on his side with imprints from the wood on his cheek. Some of the color had returned to his face and he seemed to be recovering well.

The growling in his stomach again reminded him that he needed food. He couldn't remember the last time he had eaten. He decided that it couldn't hurt to eat one granola bar. The rest of the team was surely hungry as well, especially Hotch seeing as how he had emptied the contents of his stomach the previous night. He looked around and saw that no one else was awake yet, although he suspected that Reid was only pretending to be asleep.

He gingerly got up off of the hard shelter and opened up the box of bars, carefully trying not to rip the cardboard tab that could be used to reseal the box. He took one out and unwrapped it, not letting a single crumb fall to the sandy ground. The granola bar was old and probably stale and it didn't have much flavor, but in that moment it was the best thing Morgan had ever eaten. Once he was finished, he walked over to the fire and added some twiggs from the small pile of kindling that was starting to accumulate. The chill of the morning was still settled over him so he rubbed his hands together for friction. The dancing flames made different shapes and rearranged themselves. Just when he thought he could make one out, it would change to something else.

He didn't realise he was zoning out at the fire until he was startled by Emily's soft, "hey."

"Hey." he replied, not able to tear his eyes away from the flames.

"Last night was rough, huh." she said, sitting down next to him.

"You could say that again." he said shaking his head, still keeping his eyes on the fire.

"How are you feeling this morning?" she asked him.

"Hungry, but I'm pretty sure that's not from the bad water." he said, finally looking up at her. The short time on the island had already changed her physical appearance. Her face had smears of dirt and small scratches on it and her face was free of makeup.

"I think we're all hungry, Morgan." Rossi said, joining them at the fire.

"That reminds me, I did have a granola bar this morning, and I think everyone should get one." he said. He knew that the team would understand his hunger because they too were experiencing it.

"Aye aye," Rossi said, "I'm never one to turn down food."

"And, I am definitely in. I always loved granola" said Emily, looking down at her stomach.

"Did you guys say granola?" JJ said, eyes bright. Spencer stood beside her, looking less perky and rubbing his eyes with the back of his fists.

"Yeah. I made an executive decision that we're each gonna have a full granola bar. We need it." Morgan said.

"Yes!" JJ exclaimed. It was odd to see her so excited over something as trivial as granola bars, but her eyes lit up and her mouth cracked into a big grin either way. He watched as she ran over to the box and grabbed four bars. He couldn't help but smile as he saw how each of them savoured every bite of their bars, just as he had done himself. Rossi was the first to finish his, practically swallowing it in three bites, but Prentiss, Reid, and JJ all took their time. Nobody said what they were all thinking which was that this might be the last time they get to eat anything that came from a package. He shook the thought away, and instead focused his attention on rescue. He imagined what Garcia was doing at this moment. She was probably freaking out and doing everything she could to get them back. He would bet money that she hadn't had a good night of sleep since she had found out. She was just the type of person who cared about other people with her whole heart. He didn't even want to think about what she would do if something happened to all of them out on this island.

Morgan looked over to where Hotch's sleeping form had been just minutes before and was alarmed for a second when he didn't see anyone. He swung his head around and saw that he had just gotten up and was slowly making his way over to the fire. Morgan hurriedly got up and went over to him for support. Hotch gladly accepted Morgans help so Morgan put an arm around his back and Hotch slung his arm over Morgan's shoulders.

When they finished the short trip to the fire area, Morgan gently helped Hotch to sit down next to Emily.

"So how are you feeling?" JJ asked cautiously.

"I'm… Hungry." he replied, with only a little bit of shakiness in his voice.

"Well that's probably a good sign." Emily added in.

"It is a good sign." Spencer replied. Morgan got back up, having just sat down on the other side of Hotch, and walked back over to the shelter. He opened the box of granola back up and retrieved one of the now familiar shiny green packages. He walked back again to the fire and handed it to Hotch.

"No, we need to ration these." Hotch protested.

"You need this now man. If you die out here then there won't be any need for rations, will there?" Morgan asked, a little bit of anger edging into his voice at the unit chiefs stubbornness.

"Alright." he conceded, obviously too tired to argue. He slowly unwrapped the food and carefully ate it. After eating, he already looked better. Most of the color had returned to his face, and his eyes looked less glassy.

"Alright, let's figure out tasks for the day," Hotch said, "Morgan, Reid, I want you two to look for a more steady food source; whether that be fishing or something else. JJ, Emily, I want you guys to do a little exploring of the island. Go in the direction that we haven't been yet. Dave, you and I are going to work on building a small raft, not for trying to get back to the mainland, but maybe for fishing. Everybody clear?" Hotch said simply.

"Woah woah woah. Not so fast. You need to rest." JJ ordered.

"I'm fine." he said.

"You are not fine. You need to relax. I think the team will back me up on this?" she asked them. Everyone nodded and Hotch sighed in defeat.

"Okay. I'll rest. But I will still delegate tasks, and this is just for today. Tomorrow I'm getting back to work. Now everybody get to work" he relented.

When no one moved right away, Emily said, "you heard the man, get to work!" and with that they all spread out.

Morgan walked over to where Reid was still sitting and asked, "you ready kid?" Spencer nodded and pushed himself up to his feet. "So where do you wanna start looking?" he asked again, partially because he wanted to know the answer and partly because he just wanted to get the kid talking. When he didn't respond, Morgan looked over and saw him rubbing his temples with the heels of his hands.

"Reid, do you have a migraine?" he asked.

"Huh? Oh, no. I'm fine. What was the question?" he replied.

"I asked where you wanted to start lookin'. It sure does look like you have a migraine kid. You can tell me if you do." he said.

"I'm not a kid, and I don't have a migraine." he snapped, "and honestly I think it would be better if we searched alone. We could cover more ground that way."

"Fine, if that's how you're gonna be." Morgan replied, a little hurt by Reid's tone. "I'm gonna go look down by the water." he said.

"I'll look up near the lagoon." he replied. Morgan watched as Reid stalked off into the jungle like terrain. He sighed and pushed the sunglasses that were resting on his forehead down so that they shaded his eyes, shading everything in a brownish tint.

At the water's edge, Morgan didn't really expect to find anything that they could eat, but really he just wanted an excuse to be alone. The water lapped at his bare feet and then retreated. He couldn't seem to tear his eyes away from the rhythmic motion of the waves and he was reminded of how he had been so captured by the flames this morning. Why was Reid being so difficult? Didn't he know that he could talk to him about anything? So why was it so hard for him to talk about his migraines? He kicked at a nearby pebble in frustration, sending the projectile into the water with a splash. He just hoped the kid wasn't mad at him.

Reid wasn't mad at Morgan. In fact, he felt bad for snapping at him like he did. He just didn't want anyone to worry or be troubled over him, so the best method of defense was to lash out. He couldn't stop picturing Morgan's face as he yelled at him; shocked and disbelieving. He sat down on a fallen down tree and let the soft moss that was growing there cushion him.

He debated about whether or not to go and find Morgan to apologize. On this island, there was no room for trivial arguing, so he decided to go and look for him. When he got up, he saw something that stopped him dead in his tracks. Right where he was about to step, a long snake crept silently over the jungle floor. He immediately identified it as a boa constrictor. It looked to be not yet full grown but was still very long. He recalled all of the things he knew about boa constrictors and snakes in general. Before he even knew what happened, his instincts took over and he grabbed a nearby rock near his left foot that was about the size of a baseball.

Without thinking, he raised the rock and brought it crashing down on the soft spot on the back of the snakes head. It immediately reacted and its tail whipped out and wrapped itself around Spencer's leg. He tried to shake it off but the grip was too tight, so instead he brought the rock down again in the same place he had before. The snake showed no signs of stopping, and in fact started to squeeze. Spencer felt panic starting to set in as he realised the situation he was in. He couldn't think of anything better to do, so he just kept bashing it on the head. After about three minutes of intense struggle, the snake went limp and the grip loosened. It fell to the ground and Spencer stumbled back down onto the log. He let out a breathe he hadn't known he was holding and wiped his brow. He looked down at the animal and said a silent thank you to the snake for giving its life for him and his team to eat. He had never killed an animal before, and he almost felt sick looking down at the limp carcass.

He picked it up, noticing that it weighed around twelve pounds. He draped the body around his arms and began picking his way carefully over the twisty jungle floor, avoiding roots and vines. When he came out from the jungle, he saw that Morgan was down by the water's edge, Hotch was sitting by the fire with Rossi, and Emily and JJ were nowhere to be seen. He stumbled over to the fire, presenting the snake out in front of him. Rossi was the first one to see it when he looked up from poking the fire.

"Hey, would you look at that. Nice job kid." he said. Spencer blushed slightly at the praise and the use of the word kid, but he accepted the praise. Hotch looked up at Rossi's exclamation and saw the snake dangling from Spencer's arms.

"Good work, Spencer. That will be very helpful." Hotch praised. Spencer nodded and handed the snake over to Rossi who had stretched out his arms for it.

"This thing's pretty heavy." he examined. Morgan, having heard the slight commotion, joined them over at the fire and saw the snake. His eyebrows shot up and he looked at Spencer.

"Did you catch that thing?" he asked him.

"Well, it kind of caught me, but yes." he replied.

"That'll be a good meal. I'm proud of you kid." he said, clapping Spencer on the back.

"Thanks. And about earlier, I-" he was about to apologize when Morgan cut him off.

"Don't mention it. We all have those moments." he said. Spencer only nodded and looked down awkwardly.

"I'm going to clean this so we can cook it for about five o'clock." Spencer said, lifting the snake from Rossi's hands. He took it over to the edge of the jungle and draped it over a low hanging branch. Next, he went over to the shelter and found the place they had stored the knife. He grabbed it and walked back over to wear he had set the snake.

He started by laying the whole body on a flat rock that was conveniently located near him. He raised the knife over his head so he could build up momentum as he brought it down and chopped off the head of the snake. He reached into the tube like body and the organs all came out in a long string. He pitched the organs into the woods. He supposed a normal person would have been grossed out by this or disgusted, but he was almost fascinated. If he had had a sterile environment or if circumstances were different, he probably would have examined the internal structure of it. But these were not normal circumstances.

The skin of the snake peeled off of the body easily, in one long tube. That did make sense because snakes are build to shed. He disposed of the skin the same way he had the rest of the byproducts. Again, he internally thanked the snake for giving its life. He was so ready to eat some actual food, not just stale granola bars and warm water.

He picked up the long tube of meat and brought it over to the fire where someone had riged a pretty clever system over the fire. They had half of the metal container the fishing kit had come in over on the hot coals so it acted as a pan. Spencer cut the meat up into little nuggets so they would be easier to divide up later and he placed them onto the "pan" to cook. The smell of cooking meat filled all of their nostrils and Spencer's mouth began to water. It smelled kind of similar to chicken but there was something else about it.

Spencer looked over to the East side of the island and saw the approaching figures of JJ and Emily. They only carried firewood, so he assumed their trip had been relatively uneventful.

"Is that meat?" JJ asked when she arrived.

"Pretty boy caught us a snake to eat." Morgan said with a grin as he reached over and tousled his hair. If there had been any doubt in Spencers mind that the animosity between them had cleared, that removed it.

"Spence, that's amazing!" JJ exclaimed.

"Way to go Spencer." Emily said, offering him a warm smile. He accepted the compliments and got back to pushing the morsels of meat around on the metal surface. When they looked like they were cooked all the way through, he said, "okay, I think it's time to eat." and everyone reached into the pan and grabbed a chunk.

"Wait, before we eat, I would like to say thank you." JJ said, "Thank you to this snake for giving its life to feed us. And thank you to Spencer for getting it for us. This snake is going to go a long way." she said. Everyone raised their piece to the middle and they did a sort of awkward cheers.

When Spencer put the little chunk of meat into his mouth, it burst with flavour. It tasted slightly of chicken, with lots of small bones crunching in between his teeth. It was hot and he was pretty sure he burned his tongue, but he didn't care at all. There were sounds of contentment from all around the circle they had made around the fire and everyone ate as much as they could. They ended up having a perfect amount, with everyone being full and there being no extra.

Spencer was sure that nothing could ruin this moment until he felt a sharp pain coming from his chest. He put a hand over the bandage and felt the rough material. The skin underneath felt swollen and irritated. He didn't want to think about what that meant. No one around the fire noticed the look of dread that had fallen across his face.

 **Author's Note: I don't know how I feel about this chapter, but then again, I don't know how I feel about anything I write. I'm so self conscious about my writing, it's a problem. Anyway, hope you enjoyed.**


	7. When it rains, it pours

**Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or any of the characters.**

David Rossi looked down at the dinghy little raft and was overwhelmed with a feeling of pride. He had managed to build it almost all by himself, with only a little bit of help from Hotch ( he had tried his very hardest to get the unit chief to relax and not do any work, but it was an impossible task). He nudged the possibly unreliable raft with his toe and the bamboo like wood he had found creaked under his weight. It was then that he regretted having built the raft that they had arrived on the island with into the shelter. It would have been so much easier if they could have just used that.

Judging by the position of the sun, it was about five o'clock. After he had finished his portion of the snake, he had gone back to working on the raft with Hotch as his supervisor. He had used most of the small coil of rope to attach the bamboo like branches together. It looked like it would fit four people maximum, and even if it did, he didn't know how long it would last. But it was something.

"Good work Dave" Hotch said, coming up behind him and placing a hand on his shoulder. He looked significantly better since he had eaten a significant amount of protein.

"Thank you Aaron, although I'm not quite sure how she'll fare out in the sea" he admitted.

"It should be fine. And if worse comes to worst, I could make the tactical decision to dismantle the shelter and use the rubber raft" he replied. Dave nodded and looked out at the surprisingly calm ocean. It looked peaceful and it was hard for him to connect this serene sea as being the same one that they had been so brutally dumped into in the first place. He still had the bruising on his back to prove it. The setting of the sun cast an orange glow onto the water and he had to admit that it was very beautiful. He sighed and folded his arms across his chest. He looked over at Aaron who seemed to be deep in thought, staring out at the tranquil water.

"Whats on your mind?" Dave asked. He could always tell when something was bothering his friend.

"What?" Aaron asked back, pretending he didn't know what Dave was talking about.

"Come on Aaron. I'm a profiler. And even if I wasn't, you're my friend and I know you well enough to be able to tell when something is bothering you" he retorted. There was a short silence while they both stared at the ocean and contemplated.

Rossi was beginning to think that his friend was just going to ignore him until he said, "It's just… I hate it when I have to lower my guard down in front of people, and last night, my guard was all the way down. The team depends on me to be strong and I can't let them down. If that water had had something worse in it and I had died, what would have happened to you all?" he subsided.

Dave looked away for a moment before saying, "Aaron. You don't need to worry about us. Every member of this team is strong in their own way. Emily, she's so level headed and driven, her determination could get her anywhere. Derek, he really cares about his job and he has a purpose. That's what gets him through. Spencer, Spencer is so brilliant and his brain could get him out of anything. And JJ, JJ is so strong. We all have these incredible traits, and that's part of the reason our team works so well together; our combined skill. I'm not saying that we don't need you or that we don't want you. But Aaron, we would find a way to keep moving forward."

"Thank you Dave, I really needed to hear that." Hotch said.

"No problem. I didn't know I could be so motivational." he replied, turning back into his normal sarcastic self. "What do you say tomorrow we take this baby out on the water?" he asked, gesturing to the raft.

"Sure why not." Hotch replied. Rossi smiled to himself at the prospect of fish. The snake was good and all, but it wouldn't compare to fish. It was what Rossi had been dreaming about the whole time he had been out here. But now it was late, and there wasn't enough light left in the day to go fishing.

He found himself walking over to the fire, perhaps drawn in by the subtle heat, or maybe the welcoming orange glow. He had noticed that the fire had become a sort of gathering place for the team and they all seemed to congregate there at the beginning and end of each day.

He sat down near the edge of the flames and sighed heavily. Morgan sat a couple of feet away and Emily and JJ sat on the other side of him.

Rossi picked up one of the water bottles near the edge of the pit and said, "So is this safe to drink, or what?" Morgan took off his sunglasses and glared at him. "Too soon? Okay." he said holding up his hands in the universal gesture for admitting that you have made a mistake. Morgan just put his sunglasses on and shook his head, but Rossi could see a faint smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

Hotch came over and sat on the other side of Rossi, sighing slightly as he lowered himself to the sandy ground.

"Is everyone up for some fishing tomorrow?" Hotch asked.

"Well you all know how it turned out when I tried to fish, so maybe someone else should be in control of that." Morgan said.

"Well, not to brag or anything, but I did get the fishing patch in the girl scouts." JJ said only half jokingly.

"Okay, I nominate JJ as the designated person to hold the pole," said Emily, "all in favor say, 'I'" she said. Everyone in the circle collectively said I and Rossi wasn't quite sure but he thought he saw a faint blush on JJ's cheeks.

"I also think we could try some spear fishing. When I tried, there were a bunch of colorful little fish all way down there, but none of them even came close to biting the line. But I think if someone could get down there it would be pretty easy to get 'em" Morgan said.

"I don't know, that seems pretty hard." JJ said questioningly.

"Well, isn't it worth a shot?" Morgan questioned back. JJ just creased her eyebrows and shook her head slightly.

"Hey, has anyone seen Reid lately?" Emily asked, having noticed the young agents absence from the circle. Rossi looked around and he too found that Reid was not with all of the other agents. His heart rate started to speed up a little bit.

"I haven't seen him since we ate the snake." Rossi said. No one else had seen him since then either. Rossi told himself that Spencer had probably just gone over to the shelter to catch up on some sleep, but he couldn't help the sense of fear that fell over him with the younger agent gone

He got up and started off walking over to the shelter, but changed to a jogish run when he saw a limp body draped over the shelter. _Please be sleeping, please be sleeping!_ He thought to himself. When he got closer he could easily see the ven rises and falls of Spencer's chest and hear the slight hitch on every in breath. He let out a long breath as he understood that Spencer really was just sleeping

He walked back over to the fire and found the concerned faces of his friends. "He's just over there sleeping. Which is probably a good idea. It's getting late and I need my beauty sleep" he joked. He didn't know why he had gotten so worried. His brain had jumped right to the conclusion that Reid was dead, not even considering the highly more probable scenario in which Spencer was not dead, just sleeping. He shook his head to himself. So absurd. It was the island, messing with his head and muddling reality. What he really needed was a full night's sleep.

"Alright guys, I'm gonna hit the hay." he said with a yawn.

"Yeah I think I'm gonna turn in too." Morgan agreed. The others didn't say anything, but their tired nods and droopy eyelids said it all. The team slowly made their way over to the shelter, resenting the fact that they had to leave the warmth of the fire as the now cool night air prickling their skin was a constant reminder of the heat they had lost.

Rossi got under one of the reflective thermal blankets and shivered to himself. Even with the body heat from himself and Hotch, a chill still crept into his bones. He had a feeling something bad was going to happen soon, he just didn't quite know what.

The next morning, Emily was the first one to wake up. The first rays of the sun were unrelenting when they hit her eyes. She could normally sleep through something like that but today was different for some reason. She carefully got out from underneath the crinkly thermal blanket so as not to disturb JJ who was still sleeping soundly. She walked groggily over to the edge of the withering fire and added some small twiggs from the pile that they had started to make nearby. She rubbed her eyes with her fists and yawned. There was nothing that she wanted in that moment more than coffee. Except for rescue. She really wanted rescue. Emily wasn't used to needing to be rescues. In fact, she was usually the one doing the rescuing. It was so frustrating to not be able to do anything to help get them rescued. She had made the signal, but so far they hadn't seen any planes go by.

So instead of doing the big stuff, she tried to focus on the little stuff. Like getting firewood, or refilling the water bottles. She decided that refilling the water bottles would probably be the most helpful right now, so she pushed herself into a standing position and brushed the small grains of sand that clung to her legs off.

She walked along the now familiar path towards the small stream and swung her arms as she moved. She looked out over the water and the sunrise created an orange glow on the water that made it easy to forget where she actually was and how much danger she could potentially be in. Somewhere in the distance a bird sang a short little song. For some reason it reminded her of home and a dark cloud passed over her mood. She wished everything could just be normal again. She wished they were back in Quantico with Garcia going over a case. She wished they weren't on this godforsaken island.

She was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she didn't notice that she had arrived at the stream. The small stream was easy for her to step over without realising it, and she just kept walking past, staring out at the ocean. The only reason she didn't keep on walking was because she tripped. She landed on her hands and knees, the rough limestone rocks digging into her bare skin, and she looked down at what she had tripped on. What she saw surprised her. It was a metal rod, and some further investigating found that it looked like it used to be an umbrella. All of the canopy was gone, leaving just the skeleton of the metal support system behind. It was ominous in a way that she couldn't put her finger on. She wondered quickly how it had gotten here, but she shortly came to the conclusion that was just another piece of flotsam or jetsam that had been washed up.

She sighed and turned back around to get to the stream. After filling up the bottles, she carefully made her way across the harsh limestone rocks and back to the beach. She could see that the rest of the team was awake now and sitting around the fire. She joined back up with them and settled the bottles near the flames to boil.

"Good morning guys" she said with some slight enthusiasm in her voice.

"Is it though?" Rossi deadpanned. Everyone seemed to be in a bad mood and it was making Emily's mood darken too. And her mood wasn't the only thing that was darkening. The sun had gone behind a foreboding grey cloud and she looked at the sky suspiciously.

"Come on guys, we're going to go fishing today, it's gonna be fun." she said, but a loud crack of thunder punctuated her words. She looked up and right as she did the rain started falling in heavy sheets.

"Great. Just what we need right now." JJ said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"So much for that fishing" Rossi commented.

"Let's go into the shelter and wait this one out," Hotch said, "I'll try and move some of the fire over to the shelter area so hopefully we won't lose it all."

"I'll help" Emily volunteered. Hotch nodded and the rest of the team huddled over to the shelter, backs hunched against the torrential downpour. Even from some distance away, she could see them shaking. They needed fire. The fire that they had was sizzling badly and she could tell it didn't have much time. She saw Hotch grab one of the twiggs from the bottom of the pile that had managed to stay dry and shelter it with his body. He dipped it into some of the remaining flame and she watched in fascination as it burst. He hunched his body around the small source of heat to protect it from the rain and half ran half walked over to the shelter. Emily gathered up the rest of the remaining dry sticks and ran over to the shelter too.

Hotch had already build a small teepee next to the shelter under the small overhanging of the roof that they had constructed. The flame was feeble but it was still there. The goal was to make the fire close enough to the shelter that they stayed warm, but not too close that it would catch on fire. A hard balance to find.

When the flame was going stronger, Emily added in more little twiggs until it seemed like it would be able to sustain itself for a while. She leaned back into a squatting position and held her cold stiff fingers up to the heat of the flame. They really just couldn't catch a break out here.

She looked around at her teammates; each one looked more miserable than the next. Hotch had climbed up onto the raised bed of the shelter and was sitting cross legged with a reflective blanket around his shoulders. He looked miserable, with wet hair plastered to his face and drops of water clinging to his chin. Morgan was next to him, and he was turned around. He seemed to be digging through his bag, looking for something. Spencer was next to him and he looked so pale and cold. His teeth were chattering slightly, and brown curls were matted down against his head. JJ was on the other side of him and she just looked really dismal. Her eyes were closed and Emily assumed she was trying to go back to sleep. Rossi was on the other side of her and he was curled up in the fetal position under one of the thermal blankets. For what seemed like the hundredth time in the last few days, she sighed.

She found out what Morgan was looking for when he handed her a navy blue hoodie and said, "here, it'll help us to keep warm." he handed out a hoodie to everyone in the shelter and was greeted with various noises of gratitude.

"Why did you bring so many hoodies?" Rossi asked.

"You can never have too many man" Morgan responded. Emily slipped the hoodie over her head and wormed her way to the head hole. It was definitely at least one size too big, but it was certainly warm. The sleeves went down past her hands and they acted as hand warmers. She put the hood up over her head to prevent heat from escaping after a subtle reminder from Reid that most body heat is lost through the head.

They ended up in one big huddle, everyone sharing all the blankets. The rain pounded down and tested the limits of their roof. It held up pretty well, with only a few leeks in some spots. But they just avoided those areas and pressed closer together.

No one counted how long the rain lasted, but it felt like an eternity. Emily's best guess was about five hours. Most of the team had just fallen back asleep, but she couldn't for some reason. So she had spent five agonisingly boring hours just sitting there, in the cold, listening to the rhythmic patterns of the rain.

Even after the rain let up, the cold and the wind persisted. The team had tried to build up a bigger fire, but everything was thoroughly soaked. No one was in a good mood, and the lack of sufficient fire just added to that.

"At least we have plenty of water now." Rossi attempted to joke. He got no reaction though as everyone just stared blankly, each in their own world. Emily didn't know what everyone else was thinking about, but she was thinking about home again. Of coffee, of wine. Of Garcia, of Sergio. Of all the cases they were missing, of all the paperwork they would have to catch up on if they ever made it back. _God_ , she thought, _I don't think things could really get worse than this._

 **Author's Note** : Thank you all so much for the reviews, favorites and follows. They really make me happy. Anyway,,, I wrote this chapter really late at night and then I never read over it so just let me know if it is a piece of crap and I can just rewrite it.


	8. Yikes!

**Author's Note:** Ahhh, I'm so sorry this took so long. I just got back from a trip where I didn't have access to internet or my computer so I couldn't publish or write. Sorry again, but I hope maybe it was worth the wait? I don't know because I have absolutely no idea if my writing is any good or not.

 **Disclaimer** : I don't own Criminal Minds or any of the characters.

 **BREAKING NEWS**

 **Six agents in the behavioral analysis unit of the FBI were on their way back from a case in Mexico when their plane crashed somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico. All rescue efforts have been temporarily halted due to a large coastal storm. It is still unknown if there are any survivors of the crash.**

The rain had let up a while ago but the sky was still a menacing and gloomy shade of grey. Derek Morgan got up out of the shelter and stretched his sore limbs. His fingers were stiff from the cold and he brought them up to his mouth to breath some warmth into them. He looked out over the ocean and noted how quickly it could change from calm and blue to angry and somber. The waves seemed to crash onto the shore with vengeance as if they were trying to grab onto something. The rest of the team itself didn't look too good either. Their faces mimicked the demeanor of the sea and the sky. Most of them were sleeping with discouraged looks on their faces. Hotch was out getting firewood, but Morgan was pretty sure he would have the same bleak look on his face.

Even with the dismal weather, Morgan was not deterred from his goal of catching some fish. He figured the if the fish weren't biting the lines, the easiest way of getting them would be some sort of fishing spear. The only types of fishing spears he had seen were the kind that were spear guns, and the meager fishing kit hadn't contained anything like that. If he had a sharp stick, he would just have to use a lot of force to launch it in the water. Obviously, it would be easier if he could throw it from land, so maybe they could start somewhere shallow.

He walked up towards the tree line to try and find a nice sturdy stick. He selected one that looked like it would be able to withstand a good few tosses and he picked it up, a little surprised that it hadn't been scooped up for firewood already. He brought it back over near the water's edge and sat on a convenient rock.

He took out a knife that he had grabbed earlier and began to sharpen the end of the long straight stick. When he was satisfied with the point of the stick he tucked the knife back into the pocket of his shorts and began trying to figure out how to launch the spear. He held the stick in the palm of his hand and found the balance point, which he ended up marking with the stick for easy access. He gripped the spear in his fist and it felt kind of awkward and uncomfortable. From what he had seen and what he already knew, he held the spear up so it was level with his eyes. He got into position, stepping back with his left food and bending his right knee slightly, and got a bit of a running start to gain momentum. He released the spear with all his might and turned his body slightly to gain optimal force. The spear lodged itself into the sand a little ways off, about 3 inches into the sand. He could do better.

For the next two hours, he practiced his technique and with each throw, it improved. He gained more distance and more power. He also started practicing in the water. Although it was harder, it was not impossible. As long as he stood on solid ground to do it. He wasn't so sure he could do it while treading on or under the water. Nonetheless, he was ready.

He didn't exactly want to go alone again, because last time he had gotten very bored. He suspected it was not so much because the activity was especially boring, but it was more due to his short attention span.

He scanned the beach for people who would be willing to go with him. He would have gone to Hotch, but the team leader was out getting firewood so he was not an option. No one else seemed to be doing anything important so he decided to ask around a little bit and see if anyone was interested. The closest person was Emily, laying down in the sand with her eyes closed. She was presumably not asleep, just resting, but he still didn't feel like he should disturb her. She looked more peaceful than she had in three days. Four days? He couldn't remember. Out here, time seemed different.

The next closest person was Rossi, who was leaning against a tree and swigging a bottle of water.

"Bet you wish that water was somethin' else, huh." Morgan chuckled after Rossi had noticed him walking over.

"You have no idea." he replied.

"Any chance you want to join me fishing?" he asked with a hint of a plea in his voice.

"Right now? I really don't feel like doing anything right now." Rossi answered.

"Eh, that's alright. I'm sure someone else will wanna do it." he sighed.

"You sure about that?" Rossi said with an arch of his brow. Morgan looked around and noticed what Rossi was talking about. He knew that everyone was in a bad mood, but this seemed extreme. Everyone was sleeping.

"Come on guys, it's the middle of the day." Morgan complained.

"What do you expect?" Rossi replied, "I think at this point everyone has lost hope." Morgan sighed again. _Well maybe if I could get some damn fish everyone would feel better,_ he thought to himself. It was frustrating and almost paradoxical. To lift the spirits they needed fish, but to get fish they needed their spirits to be lifted. And he didn't think he could do this alone. He scanned the beech for his next target and his eyes fell on Spencer, leaning against a tree near the shelter, seemingly asleep.

He walked over to his young friend and squatted down so he would be at eye level with him.

"Hey pretty boy, wanna go out and catch some fish with me?" he asked, startling Spencer out of his sleep. He looked around for the source of the voice for a few seconds before his eyes settled on him.

"Uhm, right now?" he asked, rubbing the sleep away from his eyes.

"Yes right now, why does everyone keep asking that." he said exasperatedly, throwing his hand in the air.

"I guess so, seeing as how I'm awake already." He said bracing himself on his hands ready to get up.

"Atta boy!" Morgan said, his face splitting into a wide grin. He ruffled Reid's hair, which was slightly unkempt from lack of being combed and rose from his squatting position. The pair walked over to the edge of the water and Morgan got the spear from where he had stashed it.

"I was thinkin' that we should swim out to that little island out there and do the fishing from there." he pointed to the sandbar that they had used to dive from down to the plane.

"Yeah, sounds good to me." Reid responded. Morgan thought about how the kid was being unusually quiet. Normally he would spout some fact about diving or spear fishing, but today he stayed reticent. He thought briefly to question it, but he didn't want to pry too much.

They took off their shirts and waded into the water in their shorts. Morgan was first to dive in and the cold sent a shock through his body. He didn't think he would ever get used to that. The salty water stung in his eyes, but they quickly adjusted. Swimming with the spear was a little bit awkward, but he got the hang of it. Soon, he reached the little sandbar and hurled himself down on it, back pressed into the welcoming sand. Spencer followed suit and heaved himself up onto the shore, laying on his back. They lay like that for about a minute, chests heaving and breathing returning to normal.

Morgan pushed himself into an upright position and gripped the spear the way he had learned how in practice. He peered hastily over the edge and saw a few colorful fish darting in between different shaped and sized corals. They were about ten feet down and Morgan figured if he could get himself down there for long enough, the fish would forget about him and come within the distance of his spear. He just hoped he would have enough strength to be able to throw the spear underwater.

"Alright, I think I'm gonna try and go down there," he said to Spencer, "wish me luck."

"Good luck" he said with a nod of his head. His words seemed a little breathy so Morgan looked over and saw that he was still recovering from the swim.

Derek took a deep breath in, gripped the spear a little bit tighter, and dove down. He used his feet to propel himself down to the little reef and looked around for a good spot to settle. His lungs were already begging for air so he decided on a spot and kicked back up to the surface. He didn't want to wear himself out, so he took a few seconds and dove back down again.

This time, he knew where he was going so he made his way over to a shelf of orange coral and placed himself there. It took a while to get settled and it felt unnatural, so he went back up to the surface. It was going to take a while to get this right.

He dove back down again for the third time and went immediately to his spot and settled down with his spear. He waited for a little bit and just when he thought he was going to have to go right back up, a small yellow fish swam by leisurely. He thrust the spear forward, just like he had practiced, but it didn't go nearly as fast as he had anticipated and it missed the fish entirely. He retrieved the spear and swam back up to the surface.

With barely any hesitation, he kicked his way back down to his spot and got back into position. This time, a thin roundish blue fish swam by slowly and Morgan threw the spear again. Again, it missed and he let out an air bubble of frustration. He got the spear and went back up again. This pattern repeated itself five more times, always with him being so close to a fish but ultimately missing. He decided to try to change things up a little bit.

He dove down and settled in his normal spot like usual, and he gripped the spear, the same as usual. But this time, when an orange fish swam close to his right arm, he thrust the spear forward, keeping it in his hands so he could propel it further with his strength. The tip of the spear made contact with the small fish and the sharp pint penetrated the flakey flesh so that the creature was stuck on the end of the stick. He couldn't stop himself from letting out an excited string of bubbles. He could feel his lungs, desperate for air, so he rose to the surface with one hand securing the small fish on the spear.

Morgan knew that that fish meant much more than something to eat. It was a victory, and it represented survival. Survival wasn't such a distant thing anymore, it was an actual possibility.

He broke through the surface and launched himself onto the sand, a large grin on his face as he held up the little fish for Spencer to see. The kid looked at it and a wobbly smile appeared on his face, but his eyes seemed distant. Morgan had noticed it earlier and decided against saying anything, but changed his mind.

"Hey kid, what's going on?" he asked, the smile fell slightly from his face and was replaced with a look of concern.

"What do you mean?" he asked, feigning innocence.

"Come on man, you've been off all day." Morgan pressed.

"I'm just tired. You should get back down there. Just the one fish isn't going to feed the whole team." he said. Morgan could tell that he was trying to change the subject, but decided to let it go because the kid had a point. Spencer laid back down on the sand, hands over his bandage covered stomach. Morgan dove back into the icy water, a little bit of the elated feeling from catching the first fish still there.

He lost track of how many times he dove down, but he knew it was a lot. When he got his sixth little fish, he determined that he would be done. He had enough fish for every member on the team to have their own. Besides, he was exhausted, and he thought that if he did any more he wouldn't be able to make the swim back.

He kept all the fish in a little cloth bag he had constructed out of an old t-shirt and some of the fishing wire, and he strung it through his belt loop. He looked over to Reid to affirm that he was ready for the swim back and saw that he was standing up. He also noticed that the pale young man was looking even more pale than usual. _Okay,_ he thought, _let's just make the swim back and I'll confront him about it._

He gripped the spear in one hand and dove back into the now familiar shockingly cold waters. His aching muscles worked extra hard to get him back to the beach. He finally washed up and lay down on his back to catch his breath for a moment. Spencer arrived next to him a second later, wet hair pasted down to his forehead.

A shiver ran down Morgan's spine, and he didn't think it was just from the cold. He heaved himself up and looked around. He guessed that he had spent about five hours on the sandbar, and everyone still seemed to be where they were when he had left with the exception of Hotch, who was sitting by the fire. He set the spear by the rest of the fishing gear and walked over to Hotch, the heavy cloth bag bouncing against his leg a steady reminder of his success.

He looked back at Reid and saw that he was still lying down with his eyes closed and chest heaving, the wet bandages clinging to his skin. Morgan sat down next to Hotch by the fire, fully prepared to gloat to him.

The warmth of the flame was immediately comforting against the cold drops of water that still stuck to his skin.

Hotch saw the full bag and raised an eyebrow. "How'd it go" he asked with the beginning of a smile on his face.

"Pretty good. Six fish." Morgan smiled.

"Well done Morgan." Hotch said, his lips extending into a full blown smile.

"Actually there was something else I wanted to talk to you about."

"Sure, what's going on?"

"I'm a little worried about Reid. He isn't himself."

"It's probably just the circumstances catching up to him. It's happening to all of us. The lack of nourishment and sleep is taking a toll. I'm sure that once he eats some of this fish, he'll feel better."

"Yeah… you're probably right." Morgan conceded as he drew aimless designs in the sand with his feet.

"Let's get these fish cooking. I'm sure he smell of it will do the job of summoning the rest of the team over." Hotch said. They used the makeshift pan made of the metal container set up on top of the fire. While the "pan" heated up, the two worked on scaling and gutting the fish. There wasn't much to do on the small creatures so the work went quickly.

When they had finished with that, they popped the little pieces of meat onto the skillet and instantaneously a delicious smell filled their nostrils. After not eating anything like this in a while, it smelled like heaven. One by one, the team came over to the fire, summoned by the smell. Lastly, Spencer arrived, having come up from the water. Morgan could hardly contain himself, he was so excited to eat and to watch his teammates eat. He wanted them all to be happy and to remember the feeling of being full.

The small pieces of fish cooked quickly and everyone grabbed one from the pan. When the flakey white meat touched his tongue, Morgan melted. It was so good. Maybe it was lacking in seasonings, but that didn't matter to him. He closed his eyes and savored the warm fish in his mouth before swallowing. Just the feeling of having something in his stomach was wonderful.

He opened his eyes so he could watch all of his teammates feeling the same joy that he did. He was met with smiling faces and looks of contentment. But when he looked to his left, he saw that Spencer had only eaten half of his.

"Why aren't you eatin'" Morgan asked, gesturing to the uneaten meat in Spencer's hand.

"I'm, uh, not really hungry" he replied and looked down at the ground.

"Are you kidding me?" Morgan asked, almost angry. The rest of the team was looking up now and watching the spectacle. "How are you not hungry? You have to be hungry."

"I'm just not, okay?" Spencer replied, replicating the anger in Morgan's voice.

"What is going on with you? And don't give me any of that 'I'm tired' bullshit." Morgan asked. He was met with silence as Spencer just sat and looked at his feet. "Hey, I asked you a question. What is going on with you?" Morgan asked, the anger growing. Spencer again didn't say anything, but he put down the fish and moved to start unwrapping his bandages. A sick feeling grew in his stomach as he saw what was happening. The last of the white gauze tape fell away and Morgan immediately saw the problem.

The cut he had gotten when they had dived down to their plane was swollen up to twice it's original size and was encrusted with a thin yellow line. The skin around it was an angry red and it looked eminently painful.

"Shit." was all he said.


	9. Consequences

**Author's Note: So Sorry this took me so long** **y'all. I know I SHouldn't make excuses but I have been really busy lately. Anyway, hope you enjoy. Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters.**

When Penelope Garcia walked through the open elevator doors that lead into the bullpen, there was a smile on her face and two cups of coffee in her hands. She bustled over to a familiar desk and perched herself on the edge.

"Hey handsome, I brought you a little morning pick-me-up" she said to one of her favorite people.

"Morning Baby Girl, is that coffee I smell?" Derek replied.

"But of course." she laughed.

"I can think of a few other things that would pick-me-up" he said with a smirk. Penelope looked at him and wiggled her eyebrows a few times which made Morgan crack a smile. All of a sudden, a loud ringing noise sounded throughout the room.

"What was that?" she asked, looking around. When she turned back around, Derek was looking at his hands.

"Penelope?" he asked, worry on his face. She looked at his hands and saw that they were slowly disappearing into nothing. His whole body started to fade away.

"No…" she said as she reached out to caress his face. He looked at her with pain in his eyes and started to reach out to touch her face, but was completely gone before he could. The noise sounded again and she looked around the bullpen and saw that the once busy and active office was completely empty. She was alone.

Garcia awoke with her face pressed against something hard and uncomfortable. She realised that she had fallen asleep at her desk again. She had not really been letting herself sleep for the past couple of days. She picked herself up and rubbed the tears out of her eyes. A deep imprint of a keyboard was left on her right cheek.

What she really wanted to do was go back to her dream world and maybe get to see her family again, but she knew that there was work to do. She brushed a lock of hair out of her face and cracked her knuckles.

She realised that the sound she had been hearing in her dream was the phone ringing. She saw that it was Blake, the officer who was working on trying to locate her friends. Although she was angry at him at the moment, he had told her that he would call her if he had any news about her team. She gingerly picked the phone up.

"Hello, Ms. Garcia how are yo-" he started to say

"Did you find them?" she interrupted. At this point, she really didn't care for the trivialities of polite conversation.

"No… but I was just calling to inform you that the storm has worsened slightly and we estimate that we will be able to send out rescue planes after about three days."

"Wow! Thank you so much for updating me on this extremely useful and helpful information" she said, voice dripping with sarcasm and indignation.

"Ms. Garcia, I was just trying to keep you informed on the status of this case." he said, hurt evident in his voice.

"Good day, _sir_ " she said as she hung up the phone. Before she had fallen asleep, she had been looking for a private company that would be willing to fly her out in the storm herself. Sure, maybe it was a crazy idea, but it might just be crazy enough to work. She didn't need Blake or his sudo help. She was going to go out there herself and find her friends. She began typing and soon enough a name popped up on her screen. Steady Stable Private Airplanes. _Seems legitimate,_ she thought. She clicked the link that was attached to the name and a sketchy web page came up. She looked over it briefly and decided to click the box that would get her in contact with one of the "Private Pilots" as the website called them. She was really in for it now.

Somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico

Aaron Hotchner wasn't mad. He was furious. At Life because it was unfair, at Reid for not telling them sooner, and mostly, at himself, for not realizing what had been going on. He put his head in his hands rubbed at his temples. His stomach felt sick, but this time he didn't think it was from drinking unpurified water. He could not deal with it if they lost Spencer. He just couldn't. That would be on him. He felt a responsibility to protect his team and if something happened to anyone of them, he just didn't know what he would do. It was just so frustrating. Back home, something like an infected cut would just mean a trip to the hospital, but out here it could mean death.

He was brought back to the current situation by JJ.

"Spence, why didn't you tell us sooner?" she asked, voice shaking with sadness.

"Well.. I knew there was really nothing you could do." he replied, eyes cast to the ground. At his words, Morgan got up and slammed his fist into a nearby tree.

"Like hell there isn't." he replied angrily, "we would have taken care of you. There must have been something." he said, punctuating the end of his sentence by punching the tree again.

"Derek, calm down." Emily said, putting a hand on his arm.

"Don't touch me!" he said, knocking her hand away. Emily looked hurt but returned to her seat and didn't say a word.

"Is there really nothing we can do for an infected cut?" Rossi asked, eyebrows knitted together.

"Believe me, if there was, I would have done it." Reid said.

"So what do we do? We're not just going to do nothing." JJ said.

"Well, it is imperative that I stay hydrated and nourished. Chances are that without the proper medical attention and antibiotics, the wound will continue to swell and become tender, I will get a fever and my body temperature will be heightened, and the infection may spread."

"What happened if it spreads?" Hotch asked, feeling the sickening in his stomach escalate.

"Out here, there's really nothing we can do. It is recommended that an infected wound be kept moist, but without proper antibiotics… " Spencer replied, trailing off. Morgan punched the tree again.

"Morgan! Cut the shit! What good do you think freaking out is doing? The last thing we need is for you to break your hand out here." Emily lamented. Instead of yelling back as Hotch expected him to do, Morgan sighed and leaned his forehead against the tree.

"I'm sorry. I just," his voice cracked with emotion, "I just can't do this." With that, he ran off in the direction of the stream, feet flinging sand up in the air as he went.

"Morgan! Come back here!" Hotch stated with authority. But the other man just kept running, his form disappearing into the quickly darkening sky.

"Should I go after him?" Emily asked, looking to Hotch.

"No. He'll come back." he replied with confidence. But he really wasn't so sure. He didn't know if he had ever seen him this disturbed. The whole team was looking pretty distraught. Emily had her head in her hands, obviously upset about Spencer's wound and Derek pushing her away. Rossi was staring blankly into the fire, his deep brown eyes humorless. JJ had tears welling in her eyes but was trying really hard not to cry. Spencer was looking down at the ground and his normally pale skin looked even paler than usual. Hotch himself was still feeling sick in his stomach, but that didn't stop him from getting up.

"Listen up everyone. I know things are looking pretty bad right now, but we have to look past that. We can't just stop. We have responsibilities. Once Morgan gets back, I want things to return to normal. Spencer, you are not to do any work." he said looking at each member of his team individually. Spencer looked as if he was about to protest but hung his head in defeat.

"Reid, can you walk?" Hotch asked.

"Yes" he almost snorted.

"Alright, go lay down in the shelter. I'll be over in a few minutes to talk to you." he directed. Reid got up with only a slight wince on his face and lightly limped over to the shelter. As soon as he was gone, JJ broke down. Tears streamed down her face and she covered her mouth with her hand.  
"How is this happening? What are we going to do" she asked.

"It's gonna be okay Jayje. I bet there's a rescue plane on its way right now." Emily reassured her, putting her arm around the blonde and patting her back.

"Listen, if, something… if something happens to Spencer, I need you all to stay strong." Hotch choked out. JJ's sobbing increased and she squeezed her eyes shut. " If rescue doesn't come soon, then it probably never will and, as hard as it is, we need to be able to focus on our own survival." he said. He was pretty sure he was going to throw up.

"How could you say that Aaron?" Dave asked. "It's almost like your giving up. The Aaron Hotchner I know would never give up."

"I-I'm not giving up." he defended himself. He sighed in defeat as he realised what Rossi had said was true. "Okay, you're right. I'm sorry. I lost track of what's important. I'm sorry." he said, putting his head in his hands. He felt terrible. How could he have thought like that?

Suddenly he felt a gentle hand rubbing his back. He looked up to see JJ looking at him with watery blue eyes.

"Aaron, you're a good man. We believe in you and we trust any decisions that you make for this team" she said. He looked around the fire and saw that the rest of the team was nodding in agreement.

"Thanks guys. I… Thanks" he said, not able to think of anything else to say. He got up from the fire and walked with heavy feet over to where they kept their supplies. He opened his suitcase and got out a plain white t-shirt. He then used the knife to cut a good sized piece of cloth from the shirt and put the remaining pieces of the shirt back in the suitcase. He folded the cloth up in his hands and walked down to the water's edge. The sun was completely set by now and the moon was casting glimmers of light off of the water.

He reached down and soaked the cloth completely in the icy water. His hands at this point were almost immune to the cold. He took the cloth out of the water nad rung it out, to get all the excess water out of it. Carefully he carried it over to the shelter, where Reid was laying. It looked like he had fallen asleep his arms splayed out carelessly and a bead of sweat dripping down his forehead.

Hotch sat down on the edge of the shelter next to him. He reached out and gently shook his arm. Spencer woke up with a start and tried to get up but Hotch put steadying hands on his shoulders, gently pushing him back to the floor of the shelter.

"What's going on?" Reid asked, sort of dazed.

"I'm here to add moisture to your wound. You said that would help." he replied.

"Oh, um yeah." he said, resting his head back down and closing his eyes.

"This is salt water, so it may sting a little bit." Hotch warned. Reid nodded and Hotch noticed that he tensed up a little bit as he lifted his shirt to reveal the wound. Hotch took the cloth and pressed it lightly to the base of the cut. A sharp intake of breath was the only sound that Reid made as the salty water stung his cut.

"Sorry" Hotch winced as he continued along the cut. Reid just shook his head and balled his fists. When Hotch was done wetting the wound, he pulled down the geniuses shirt. He got up and left an already sleeping Reid to go down to the water's edge to rinse the slightly pus stained cloth.

He dipped the white material into the frigid ocean and rung it out. When he was sure it was thoroughly cleaned, he walked over to a nice flat rock that would be right in the sun tomorrow and laid it out there to dry.

Hotch could feel the exhaustion starting to set in. His limbs drooped and so did his eyelids. All he wanted was to rest. He knew he should but he just couldn't stop thinking. About Reid, and what would happen if he… well he couldn't let his mind go there. And about Morgan. He expected him to be back by now and he was honestly quite surprised that he wasn't. He wondered what he was doing and he hoped that Morgan wasn't planning on sleeping away from their camp. It would be far too dangerous for one of them to be by themselves without a shelter in the night.

The soft sound of footsteps in the sand snapped him out of his thinking and he turned around from his seat at the water's edge to see Rossi approaching him with his hands in his pockets.

"How're you holding up old pal?" he asked as he sat down next to him.

"I'm doing okay" Hotch replied.

"Come on, tell me what you're really thinking about" Dave pressed.

"Well, mostly I'm worried that they're not looking for us."

"Why?"

"Well, the storm may have made it so that they can't look for us. Legally, I mean. The coastguard can't endanger their own people to look for agents who may or may not be alive. I mean, I wouldn't send my team out after an unsub if I thought there would be a high probability that they would get killed." he said.

" Don't you think Garcia would be looking for us."

"Well it wouldn't really matter even if she found our exact coordinates if they can't send anyone out to get us."

"I have a feeling she'll find a way." He said looking up from the water over at Hotch.

"Maybe. I sure hope so. I'm not sure Reid can make it that many days longer. God, Rossi, I don't know what I would do if he died." Hotch said.

"Listen to me, if anything happens, you can't blame yourself. There was no way you could have known." Rossi said earnestly.

"I know, but I just can't help but feel guilty." Hotch said, a strong gust of wind sending a shiver down his spine.

"I get it. I feel it too. That kid just seems so innocent, I just feel like I should have protected him" Rossi admitted. When Hotch didn't say anything else he said,"He's really not as young as we think you know"

"I know, so why do I feel like he's still that 20 year old new FBI agent fumbling his way around the bullpen" Hotch asked with the slightest of smiles playing on his lips.

"I do not know" Rossi chuckled as he shook his head.

The two men sat in silence by the edge of the water for a few more minutes until the silence was broken by Rossi, "Well, I think I need to get some rest if I'm going to be able to get anything done tomorrow."

"I should get some rest too." he said. He heaved himself up from the ground and brushed the sand off of his pants. He and Rossi walked side by side over to the shelter where they found the girls had already gone to sleep, one curled up on either side of Spencer protectively. Hotch smiled inwardly at the sight and went to lay on the other side of Emily. He used a balled up sweatshirt as a pillow and covered himself up with one of the reflective sheets.

As he drifted off to sleep, he had a growing feeling of dread. He shivered to himself despite feeling perfectly warm. The next few days were going to be rough.

 **Author's Note: Okay I will admit that I wrote this really late at night and I didn't edit it at all, so sorry if there are any terrible mistakes.**


	10. Moving Day

**Authors Note:** Hey all, again, I'm sorry this took me so longggg.

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own Criminal Minds or any of the characters

The waves crashed relentlessly on the on the shore of the island as Derek ran. He knew he was being selfish and immature and a hundred other lousy things, but his mind was so clouded over with anger that he really didn't care. His feet sent sand flying up as he went until he got to the rocky area. The harsh terrain did little to nothing to slow his pace.

He closed his eyes against the tears that threatened to spill down his cheeks, hurling himself blindly away from his problems. He couldn't believe this was happening. First the crash, then Spencer. It was all too much for him. He shook his head and sped up his pace, his steady run turning into a breathless sprint.

At some point after he had been running for a while, he felt chilling water hit his fet and splash up onto his calves. He stopped abruptly and looked down. He realised he had arrived at the stream they had been using as a source of water. As far as he knew, no one on the team had gone past this point at all but he didn't care. He kept going, adopting an almost leisurely walking pace. He breathed in deeply, attempting to regain the breath that had been lost in his wild race. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and looked down at his feet as he walked. The rocks had turned into smaller pebble size.

The only real hope he had at this point was salvation, but he wasn't stupid. He knew the more time that went by without rescue, the less of a chance it would come at all. But, God, he couldn't think about that right now.

It had gotten so dark at this point that he could hardly see a foot in front of his face. He knew it wasn't safe to sleep away from the camp, but he just couldn't go back now. He also knew he wasn't thinking straight from the adrenaline rush, but he really just didn't care. Besides, the pebbles had turned into a soft sand after a while. It felt comforting and soothing under his aching feet so he figured it would feel nice to sleep on as well.

He walked on for about two minutes and decided to settle down far enough away from the ocean so that he wouldn't be too cold, but not so close to the forest that he would have to worry about creatures. He laid himself down on the sand that still held a little bit of warmth from the days sun. He spread his arms out on either side of him, palms facing the sky, and looked up at the sky. For the first time since he had been on the island, he noticed how clear the sky was. The stars shone down on him with an intense light that captured his attention immediately. And again, for the first time since he'd been on the island, he let the tears fall freely down his face. A low sob escaped him as he looked into the depths of the sky.

He turned onto his side, curled in the fetal position and pulled the sleeves of his hoodie over his finger tips. He was so tired. He worked out that he would go back to the camp as soon as he woke up. He would apologize to the whole team, especially Emily, and then, hopefully, things would go back to normal. Finally, he let a deep dreamless sleep overtake him.

When Morgan woke up, it was to the first blinding rays of the sun bouncing of off the water. He sighed as the events of the previous nights came rushing back to him. He pushed himself up into a sitting position and ran a hand over his head. The harsh sun reminded him again that he wasn't at camp as he reached over to the spot where his sunglasses usually were and came up with a handful of sand. He sighed again.

He looked at his surroundings for the first time since last night it had been pitch black. To the right, he saw just rocks and sand, but when he looked to the left his eyes widened. _Holy shit!_ he thought. _This could change everything._

The first thing JJ saw when she woke up was the sleeping face of Dr. Spencer Reid. She squeezed her eyes shut remembering everything that had happened the night before. Before she let herself think too much about it, she busied herself by carefully getting out of the shelter. The last thing she wanted was to wake up her sleeping friends. God only knew they all needed rest.

But as she looked at them lying there, she noticed two absences: first, Morgan wasn't anywhere on the shelter. She assumed he just hadn't come home at all last night. A creeping sense of worry edged into her. The second was Hotch. This wasn't entirely unusual, as Hotch often got up early. She figured he was up tending to the fire or something. Sure enough as she turned around she saw the outline of his figure in the dim morning light tending to the fire.

She approached him slowly, her bare feet sinking in to the soft sand. The chill of the morning was still present and she hugged the sweatshirt she had borrowed from Derek closer to her body.

"Hey" she said to Hotch as she put a hand on his arm. He startled slightly, the soft sand had apparently masked the sound of her footsteps approaching. He looked like he hadn't gotten much sleep last night, dark circles lined his eyes and his whole body seemed to sag towards the ground as if gravity were too much for him today.

"Hey," he replied, "Morgans… he's not back yet." even his voice sounded exhausted.

"I'm sure he's fine. If anyone can handle a night out of the shelter it's Morgan." she did her best to assure him. But the increase of the worry lines on his face showed her that he had seen through her calm demeanor. He sat down next to the fire and put rested his head in his arms which were propped up on his knees.

"Do you think we should go and look for him?" he asked, looking up at her.

"I don't think so. Morgan's smart. He'll come back on his own." she said mustering up as much confidence as she could. This was certainly an odd situation; usually the roles were reversed and Hotch was the one consoling her. The unit chief almost never showed vulnerability. Almost.

"You're right. I just hope he comes back soon."

"Now it's my turn to ask you something, and please be honest with me." she said and sat down next to him, "do you think anyone is coming to rescue us?" the question had been plaguing her since they had arrived at this island and she just had to get it off her chest.

"Honestly? Don't let this discourage you, but I don't" he said, not making eye contact. She sighed and ran a hand through her hair in the way she did when she was frustrated.

"I don't know how much longer we can do this Hotch" she said.

"I know… I know" he replied and shook his head. A soft and gentle hand on her shoulder alerted JJ to the presence of Emily. She looked groggy and her hair was slightly tangled but the emotion in her eyes was clear. JJ wasn't sure but she thought her eyes looked a little red around the edges.

"Where is Morgan?" she asked as she sat down next to JJ.

"Not back yet." JJ responded. Emily's eyes widened.

"Is he okay, should we go look for him?" she asked.

"No, we decided we're gonna let him come back in his own time" Hotch replied.

"Oh. Okay" she said. She leaned over close to JJ and rested her head on her shoulder. Her dark brown hair cascaded over JJ's shoulder and mingled in with some of her own blonde hair. JJ petted her hair in a way that she hoped was reassuring.

Jennifer looked up as Rossi approached the group. He was unusually quiet as he sat on the other side of Hotch, the only sound he made was a sigh as he lowered himself to the ground. The group sat in an almost awkward silence. It just wasn't the same without the other two members of the team, and nobody wanted to wake up Spencer. The only thing that disturbed the group was Hotch's occasional stirring of the fire with a slightly charred stick they had found to be good for that purpose.

Suddenly the quiet was disrupted by the sound of someone yelling something. Four pairs of highly trained eyes all looked over at the same time.

"Morgan!" JJ yelled. Emily and Hotch were the first to jump to their feet followed shortly after by Rossi and JJ. They all ran over to meet him but Hotch was the first to reach him. When JJ got there she saw that Morgan was bent over double, his hands braced on his knees, and Hotch had a hand on his back. He was breathing heavily and she had to assume he had run all the way there.

"Derek, are you all right? We were all worried about you." JJ said placing a hand on his back next to Hotch's.

"I'm fine- but I think I found something that could save us" he said between breaths.

"What is it?" asked Hotch.

"I think it's best if I show you. It's a bit of a walk but it's worth it. And we should bring all of our stuff too."

"What? Morgan, we're not just going to pack up all of our stuff and leave if you don't tell us what's going on." JJ said.

"Please Jayje, just trust me." he said, straightening up and putting a hand on her shoulder. He looked her right in the eyes and he just looked so sincere.

"What do you think, Hotch, Rossi, Emily?" she asked, addressing each of her teammates.

"I trust him. I mean whatever it is, it's gotta be better than this" Rossi said.

"I trust you Morgan. I know you won't let us down." Hotch said, almost threateningly. Morgan nodded in acknowledgment.

"Sure" Emily said and looked at the ground.

"That reminds me Em," Morgan said and went over to stand in front of Emily, " I am so sorry for the way I treated you last night. There really is no excuse for how I acted, just know I'm sorry."

"Forgiven" she said and smiled up at him.

"And to everyone else, I'm sorry for how irresponsible I was. I know I made you worry. I wasn't thinking." he said as he rubbed the back of his head.

"It's alright Morgan. All that matters is that you're back now and you're safe." JJ said.

"Okay, let's go pack up our things so we can head out." Morgan said. JJ noticed how excited he was. Almost giddy, like a kid on Christmas morning. Whatever this big surprise was, she hoped it was good.

Everyone kind of lingered until Hotch said, "You heard the man. Lets go" no one responded, but they showed their understanding by moving into action. They all walked up to the shelter and grabbed their bags. JJ took her duffle and carefully folded all of her clothes into it. She also managed to stuff in all three of the insulating blankets and a few of the survival items they had attained. She looked around and saw that the others had also taken on some extra responsibilities. Emily was putting the medical kit into her bag and Hotch was stuffing their plastic water bottles into his. Morgan and Rossi divided up the rest of their equipment including the fishing spear.

She could hardly believe that this was happening. Although this camp was far from perfect, she had grown sort of fond of it in the past few days. It had become a sort of home away from home. There was really only one thing left that needed to be done. No one wanted to, but someone had to wake Spencer. She sighed and put down her duffle. As she approached the shelter, she saw that he was basically in the same place she had left him that morning. His long limbs sprawled awkwardly over the wood that made up the floor of the shelter. His cheeks were pink and there were beads of sweat on the side of his face. There was no doubt in her mind that he had a low grade fever. She had seen it many times with Henry.

She sat on the edge of the shelter and put a hand on his forehead. Warm. As gently as she could, she grabbed his closest arm and shook him lightly.

"Huh, what's goin on?" he slurred as he rose from his deep sleep. He pushed himself into a seated position and braced himself with his arms. He looked around, dazed.

"Actually, Spence, we're moving our camp." she said

"What? Why" he asked, confused. He put a hand up to his head and rubbed at his temples.

"Well, we don't exactly know, but we do know that Morgan found something worth moving for. He's making us wait until we get there to tell us, but I trust him. It'll be worth it" she reassured.

"M'kay" he said, accepting easily this explanation.

"It's kind of a long walk. Do you think you can make it?" she asked.

"Of course" he said matter of factly.

"Alright, we're heading out in about ten minutes. Think you can be ready to go by then?" she asked. Maybe she was babying him a little bit, but at this point she didn't care.

"Yes" he replied.

"Okay good. I'll be over there if you need anything" she said, pointing to the fire where the others were gathered. With that she got up and walked over to where they were congregated. Emily was holding one of the water bottles and it was full of what seemed to be ocean water.

"We need to put out the fire. It's the responsible thing to do" said Rossi, gesturing to the water bottle.

"Since the fire has kind of been your thing since we got here, we figured we'd save the honours for you" Emily said as she handed over the bottle. JJ simply nodded as she took the bottle. She unscrewed the cap and almost unceremoniously dumped the contents onto the already dying flame. She watched as it sizzled out to nothingness. She realised that this was more than just the responsible thing to do. It was symbolic. It symbolised leaving behind, and new beginnings.

The group wordlessly moved over to the shelter to make final preparations for leaving. JJ sat on the edge of the shelter and pulled on her sneakers. The shoes felt weird and confining on her feet, having been used to being barefoot for so long. She pulled the laces as tight as possible and tied them forcefully. She looked around at the others and saw they were mostly ready to go. They were all standing, looking around at their beach. Spencer was standing on his own, holding his bag, and it looked to JJ like he would be able to make the trip.

"You ready, Jayje?" Morgan asked her, seeing as how she was the last one left sitting down

"Yeah, you guys go on ahead. I'll catch up in a minute" she said.

"Okay.. don't take too long" he said, sensing that she needed privacy to say goodbye to this place. She nodded and with that the group set off at a slow pace to accommodate for their injured member.

She knew what she was about to do was silly, and she didn't want the others to know. She reached into her bag and pulled out the knife that she had stuffed in their earlier. She took it firmly in her hand and began carving into the wood of one of the posts that held up their shelter. It took her about one minute and she stepped back to admire her handywork. It read simply, "we were here". It felt silly and juvenile, but also necessary. It brought a sense of closure, almost. She put the knife back in her bag and slung it over her shoulder. She ran to catch up with the rest of her friends and she never looked back.

 **Authors Note:** Again, sorry this took so long, and thank you all for sticking with me through this slowness. Also, sorry if this chapter seems a little boring. I promise, it will be more exciting next time ;)


	11. Laughter is the Best Medicine

**AN: Hey everyone, ohmygosh I am so sorry this took so long. I don't even have any excuses. Maybe if I was a more experienced writer zi would have written the whole story ahead of time so I could give more frequent updates. Anyway, all I can really say is I'm sorry and thank you all for sticking with me. Yikes. Also, as usual I wrote this really late at night and didn't check over it at all so sorry for any mistakes.**

 **Disclamer: I don't own Criminal Minds or any of the characters**

Rossi didn't feel the least bit despondent about leaving their old camp behind. He didn't know exactly where they were going or what Morgan was so excited for, but judging by the gleam in Morgans eyes, he felt that whatever it was was something to be eager about. They had been walking for about 50 minutes and the sweat had been dripping down his back for a while. The sun had fully risen a while ago and it was beating down on all of them with ferocious waves of heat. The journey had so far mostly been spent in silence, save for the crashing of waves onto the rough rocks. Rossi knew from experience that they were close to the stream they used as a water source.

Hotch and Morgan had been leading the group with Emily and himself in the middle, and Reid and JJ taking up the rear. They had been going at a fairly even pace when, abruptly, Morgan and Hotch stopped.

"Why'd we stop?" asked Emily, "I thought what you found was after the stream" she concluded. Hotch didn't answer but he held up a finger as if to silence them. Rossi noticed that Morgan had gone ridgid. He couldn't see whatever it was that had stopped them dead in their tracks but he didn't want to think about what would make Morgan and Hotch react like that. His blood ran cold in his veins as he gingerly stepped around the two agents so he was standing next to them as Emily did the same on the other side.

"Oh my God" he breathed. In front of them was their stream, but that wasn't what made his hands start to shake. On a large sunny rock sat four alligators. His breath caught in his throat. He had of course seen alligators on TV, but these beasts were nothing like what he had seen on TV. Everything about them screamed powerful from the large rigid tail to the enormous black jaw.

"Are you kidding me? Alligators?" Emily asked rhetorically, frustration clear in her voice.

"Not alligators, caiman. Black caiman, to be precise" said Reid who was now standing beside Rossi with JJ next to Emily so that they stood in a line.

"What the hell is a caiman?" asked Rossi.

"The black caiman is the largest of all the alligator species and is known for its aggression. Like most reptiles, they're nocturnal which is probably why they're all sleeping right now. Chances are they won't attack unless they're provoked, but it is true that unwarranted attacks have occured" Reid concluded, looking slightly out of breath.

The words struck even more fear in to Rossi's heart. Unwarranted attacks? What if these caiman were feeling particularly belligerent today? He shuddered as he looked over at the creatures. He knew that most of the attacks were probably on stupid tourists to get pictures of the animal and he didn't hold it against them.

"I propose that we walk carefully upstream and continue our walk through the jungle for at least a little while. Although the terrain may be more difficult, we eliminate the risk of the caimen" Hotch said, a look of concentration on his dark features. Rossi simply nodded and followed the others as they walked up along the river bank.

It soon became clear that crossing the stream further up would not be an option. The stream widened out the closer they got to the jungle and the current was rapid to say the least. Rossi sighed. _Why can't anything around here just be easy?_

"All the rain we've been getting must have affected the current of the stream" JJ pointed out.

"Okay let's find the medium ground between getting eaten by caiman and drowning in the river" Rossi said sarcastically. He looked over to Hotch and saw the man rubbing his temples. He knew he was dreading making this decision. He decided to take some of the pressure off by saying, "I say we do it right here" he said, walking over to a spot about 25 feet away from the caiman where the current didn't seem too bad.

"Looks good to me" Hotch said after looking side to side a few times. His expression seemed to lighten a little bit.

"I'll go first" Morgan said after a moment of silence. After no protest, he took a deep breath and Rossi looked on as he reached down and took off his flip flops and stuck them into the bag he was carrying. He took a cautious step into the water and Rossi saw a slight chill run down his spine at the cold of the water. He wadded in further until the water was at his waist. At this point, he had put his bag and everything else he was carrying above his head.

Rossi watched as Morgan pushed his way to the other side of the stream, the effort it took visible on his face. His jaw was set tightly and his eyebrows were knitted together from the strain it took for him to walk in a straight line against the powerful current. His features didn't relax until he was securely on the other side. He fell back into a seating position and gave the others a thumbs up from the other bank.

Rossi let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding in when he saw that Morgan was safe. He risked a glance over at the caiman and saw that they were still sleeping soundly, apparently undisturbed by the struggle they were putting the team through.

"Hey guys!" Rossi snapped his gaze away from the caiman to across the river where Morgan was seated. "The current was pretty strong so you need to be careful. I was fine cause I'm a pretty bulky guy but I don't know how some of our lighter members will do." Morgan yelled.

Rossi scratched his chin in thought. He figured he would be fine but it was true that some of the others might not be. JJ for instance barely weighed above 100 pounds. And Spencer being injured as he was probably wouldn't do too well either.

"I think I have an idea" Emily said from the place where she was standing behind Rossi.

He turned around to look at her and cocked an eyebrow and said, "care to enlighten us?" She ignored his sarcastic comment and turned to the rest of the group.

"Which one of you has that rope that was in the survival kit?" she asked.

"I think I do?" JJ asked more than said.

"I think if we all attach ourselves together with that rope, we can all cross the river at once. We'll be stronger together." she said.

"That's a great idea. I'm on board" JJ said.

"I am as well" Hotch agreed. Rossi just nodded. He felt a little uneasy about the idea but didn't bring up any of his doubts to his team. He sat back and watched as JJ fished around in her duffle and triumphantly lifted the coil of rope above her head after a minute of searching.

Together they figured out the order would go Hotch first, then JJ, then Rossi, then Spencer, and finally Emily. Rossi watched as JJ found the end of the rope and wrapped it securely around Hotch's waist, tugging at the knot a few times to test it's durability. She then let out about two feet of rope before tying a tight loop around her own waist. She then passed the loose end of the rope back to Rossi. He grabbed it and, with the careful instruction of Jennifer Jareau, he tied a tight knot around his own waist. After deciding that the loop around his waist was sturdy, he passed the loose end back to Reid who took it in slightly shaky hands. Rossi felt concern churning in his stomach as he watched Spencer fumble with the rope but pushed the feeling down. Lastly, Emily secured the last bit of the rope around her own waist. They ended up having the exact amount of rope they needed. Funny how this was the one thing that seemed to work out.

Hotch looked back at all of them and gave a thumbs up and so did everyone else in response. Rossi took a deep breath as they started moving. His feet hadn't even touched the water yet and he was feeling worried. He watched as Hotch stepped in and started wading in. The rest of the team shuffled along in his wake.

He watched as JJ stepped into the water, and at this point the water was up to Hotch's calves. They kept moving. Rossi took a deep breath as it was his turn to step into the water. The chill was the first thing he noticed.

"Damn that's cold" he said, not to anyone in particular. He wasn't shocked when no one responded. The water got deeper surprisingly fast, creeping up his legs as they went. He looked up from his feet to see JJ, the water up to her knees, already starting to struggle with the current. He looked past her and saw that Hotch was in up to his waist, his bag held above his head. He could also tell the unit chief was struggling slightly against the current.

Rossi shook his head as he kept going deeper and deeper. He saw that by now JJ was in up to her waist, and she wasn't faring too well. Her duffle bag rested on top of her head where her white knuckles grasped it. And then she was gone. He was looking at the back of her blonde head and he looked away for one second, and when he looked back she wasn't there. He was shocked, his eyes wide with fear.

The only thing that snapped him out of his trance was the sharp tug of the rope around his stomach. Hotch must have noticed it too because he looked up sharpley. He could feel the rope cutting into his skin as he struggled to get a hold and dig his feet into the sand at the bottom of the river so as not to slip and have the same fate as JJ.

"JJ!" Hotch yelled. Rossi looked around desperately searching for that blonde head. His eyes scanned the water and then he saw it. A hand sticking up, waving frantically.

"Over there!" He yelled to Hotch, pointing to where he had seen the hand. Due to the rope, Hotch was the only one who could really get to her in time, so Rossi could only watch as Hotch practically threw himself after her downstream. For one terrifying second Rossi watched as Hotch's head disappeared beneath the water. He let out a gasp as he saw the unit chiefs head reappear along with the rest of his upper body.

He had JJ in his arms and Rossi saw that Hotch jerked his chin towards the river bank in the universal sign for, "let's go."

Rossi looked behind him and saw the white faces of his other two teammates, obviously as afraid as he was.

"We have to keep going" he said to them, motioning forward with his chin as Hotch had done. The other two nodded and they all trudged forward at a faster pace than before, now with a new motivation. Hotch still held JJ in his arms and ice coursed through Rossi's veins as he realised she didn't seem to be moving. That alone made him increase his pace and trudge through the current as if it were nothing.

Soon, he reached a place on the other side of the river where he could stand with only the slight pull of the river up to his calves. He glanced briefly behind him to see the others who seemed to be doing fine. In no time flat he had reached dry sand and surged over to where Hotch had already lain JJ flat on the ground. Morgan was there too, hovering worriedly. Reid and Emily weren't too far behind him. He looked on in terror as Hotch leaned down and put his ear to her mouth, simultaneously grabbing her wrist to check for a pulse. After a few seconds Rossi gasped as JJ's face scrunched up and she rolled onto her side and coughed up a mouthful of water. Hotch stumbled back at the sudden movement but recovered quickly and put a soothing hand on JJ's back as she gasped for breath.

A few seconds more of the coughing and JJ fell backwards flat onto her back, gasping from the effort. Hotch fell back as well, obviously exhausted from his little swim.

"Jesus Christ" Rossi muttered under his breath. After the adrenaline rush, he was quickly coming down. In fact, as he looked around at his team he realised they were all drained. It went unspoken, but they all decided at the same time to take at least a few minutes of rest.

Rossi leaned back until he was resting his head on the ground. That had been way too close of a call. God, he didn't know what he would have done if JJ had died right in front of him. The horror of how helpless he had felt came back to him and he had to squeeze his eyes shut in an attempt to block out the painful memory.

They were all quiet for a few minutes and Rossi didn't want to say anything to break the silence. It felt like a spell had fallen over them.

"That sucked" JJ said hoarsely, effectively breaking the silent streak. Rossi didn't know what made him start to laugh because it was just so unfunny, but once he started he couldn't stop. Big bursts of laughter, the kind of laughter he hadn't had in days. He saw Hotch looking at him like a crazy person and he didn't blame him because he knew thats what he looked like, but it felt so good that he couldn't stop. And then another laugh joined in, and he could tell it was JJ because of how raspy it sounded and that just made him laugh harder. And suddenly they were all laughing, even Hotch. Just the six of them, sitting in a big circle and laughing like maniacs.

And just as soon as the laughter had started, it died down again and it was back to silence. But this time, it was a content silence, as they all caught their breath from their little fit.

"We should probably get going" Hotch said at last.

"Hotch is right. We're almost there anyway" Morgan said with a grin.

"About that: are you finally gonna tell us where we're going, because all of this better have been worth it" Rossi said dryly.

"Oh it will be. But you're just gonna have to wait and see what it is" Morgan said. Rossi rolled his eyes but the gesture didn't hold any real annoyance.

"Lets just go then" Rossi said with mostly fake exasperation. He got up and started to walk away only to be yanked back down off his feet. Then he remembered the rope and his cheeks burned with embarrassment as his whole team laughed at him.

"Nice one, Dave" Hotch said. Rossi crossed his arms and huffed and he could only watch as Hotch and Emily, the two ends of the rope, started freeing themselves. It didn't take long for everyone on the team to get free. Rossi handed JJ the rope and she efficiently re-coiled it around her arm and stuffed in her duffle that she miraculously hung onto during the whole almost drowning ordeal. Rossi looked over to Hotch and only then did he notice that he no longer had whatever it was that he had been carrying.

Rossi frowned as he said, " hey Hotch, hope you weren't carrying anything too important" Hotch looked down and it seemed like for the he noticed for the first time that he didn't have his bag.

"Just the water bottles which I'm sure we can find more of, and all the rest of my clothes" he said, putting a hand up to his face. Rossi couldn't help but snicker at that, although he did feel a little bit bad. He would probably end up borrowing from someone.

"Okay _now_ let's get going" Rossi said, this time successfully getting up. The rest of his teammates followed suit and got to their feet. Morgan walked to the front of the group and wordlessly led the way to whatever it was he was leading them to. After walking for about ten minutes Morgan stopped them.

"It's just up ahead now" he said smiling widely.

"If this isn't worth it, so help me Morgan…" Rossi trailed off. Morgan just laughed easily brushing off the threat. Rossi looked up and he could see… something looming in the distance. He couldn't tell what it was at first, but as they got closer, his jaw dropped.

"Holy shit" Emily breathed. _Yeah,_ Rossi thought, _holy shit just about sums it up_.

 **AN: well thats it for chapter 11. I promise I will try to get these updates out to you guys a lot faster. And as always, I appreciate any sort of feedback! Thanks again for sticking with this alsoo.**


	12. Exploring

**AN: This author?** **Updating** **regularly? More likely than you would think. Anyway I was actually planning on getting this out yesterday but I got sucked into reading a bunch of Wikipedia articles. Have any of y'all heard of the Fermi paradox? That one had me thinking all night. If you want to read about something that'll make you feel philosophical, go ahead and read about it. But I warn you, you might end up staying up all night thinking about it. Whoops now I'm off topic, but anyway, enjoy the update I guess?**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or any of the characters**

Penelope Garcia wrapped her pink trench coat tighter around herself against the strong winds that seemed determined to push her over. The whole day had been gloomy and windy, with not even a hint of sunshine, which, Garcia figured, was fitting for this situation. She was walking down a strip of pavement, the heels on her shoes making a satisfy clacking noise that she didn't even get to enjoy because the only emotion that consumed her was worry.

"Don't worry sweet cheeks," said Damien, her very own "Private Pilot" whom she had contacted two days ago. If even this strange man who she had just met could tell she was nervous, she knew she was very out of it. He put a hand on her shoulder as they continued to walk that she assumed was meant to be comforting, but really it felt like it was weighing her down. "We'll get yer friends back in no time" he said with a toothy grin.

Yesterday, she had gotten into contact with Damien on the Private Pilots webpage and, after doing a thorough background check, she determined that she was going to hire him. So here she was, walking down a runway strip with a complete stranger about to board a plane that would take her into a highly dangerous storm, and that wasn't even what she was worried about. She was worried that her friends could be hurt, or maybe even… No, she wouldn't let her mind go there. The only times she thought about that were when she accidentally let herself slip into a fitful sleep, full of horrifying dreams about all of her worst fears.

"This is her, doll face, my beautiful plane!" he exclaimed.

"Can this thing even fit seven people?" she asked, ignoring the stupid, and honestly outdated and sexist pet name. The question was very valid. The plane looked like it had seen better days, with scrapy metal almost hanging off the side and even a cracked window. It also looked like maybe four people at max could fit inside of it.

"You didn't tell me it needed to fit seven" he said accusingly.

"Yes I most definitely did!" she retorted, distinctly remembering the moment she had told the man about her six teammates whom had been on the flight that never arrived.

"I thought you said this plane crashed 'several days ago over open water'" he said, mocking her tone. "If that's the case, then we probably won't need six extra seats. I bet you anything they're already dead at the bottom of the ocean. Now baby girl, if you're not gonna pay for my high quality services, then get outta my face." he snarled. Something inside of her snapped as she raised her palm and slapped the man hard across the face, leaving a ringing echo sound across the vast strip of pavement. She didn't know exactly what pushed her over the edge, maybe how he talked about her beloved teammates, or perhaps when he used _that_ nickname. The one that only Morgan could use.

Damien looked up at her and said, "bitch" and then proceeded to spit on the ground. She noted with satisfaction that there was a red imprint of a hand on his face and then stormed away as angrily as she could, all the while muttering things about Damien under her breath.

She reached the parking lot out front of the sketchy private pilot's building and leaned against the brick wall. She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and was about to call a cab for herself, when an unfamiliar dark green SUV pulled up in front of her. The windows were tinted so she couldn't get a look at the drivers face. Fear coursed through her veins dully, as she looked around and saw that she was alone in the lot.

The driver rolled down the window and Garcia gasped. This was probably the absolute last person she had expected to see out here.

Spencer Reid had been feeling slightly dazed and out of it for the whole day. But when he saw the reason Morgan had dragged them halfway around the island, a sudden clarity settled over his mind. He looked over what he knew to be a medium sized ferry boat. It looked to have been there for a while, with clusters of barnacles growing on the part of the boat that was partially submerged. The boat looked like at some point it was painted blue, but now all that was left was a few chips of blue paint here and there. It had an upper deck with what looked like old chairs or seats of some sort in a circle around the edge, where there was a railing, meant to keep ignorant tourists from falling over the edge. Below the top deck there was a dark stairwell that led to something that Spencer couldn't be sure of.

"What… How did it get here?" Emily asked, shock evident in her voice.

"My guess," Morgan said, raising an eyebrow like he did when he was profiling, "Is that they were taking some tourists out and maybe something happened to the boat and it stopped working, or maybe there was some rough weather. Either way, the captain thought it was too dangerous to continue. He got the life boats down from where they usually hung on the side of the boat," he pointed to a spot where the paint was less faded from sun exposure than the rest of the boat that was shaped almost like a dinghy, "and they all rowed to safety" he concluded.

"Either that or they crashed on this island and all died here" Rossi said.

"Way to lighten the mood" JJ said with a roll of her eyes.

"Either way, we have to check out this ship and see if there's anyway we can use it to get back home, whether that be a way to contact someone or a vessel we can use" Emily said authoritatively.

"Agreed. I say we split up into groups of two and explore the ship for around 20 minutes and then meet back up again on the top deck. We can bring back useful things that we find and have a group discussion" Hotch said. Reid scoffed a little bit at this. He didn't know why, because he was usually so good about keeping things like that on the inside. It probably had something to do with the fever. He just thought it was funny how Hotch said group discussion like in kindergarten. Not that he knew much about kindergarten, anyway. He had almost immediately been taken out of it and moved up some grades when they had realised his potential.

"Okay, Emily, you and JJ take the top deck, see what's up there. Hotch, you and Rossi can split the bottom deck with Pretty Boy and me." Morgan said with a grin aimed in Reid's direction. Reid rolled his eyes at the nickname but nodded in agreement with the plan.

"Okay, see you all back here in twenty minutes" Hotch said. The six agents paired off and wandered off in their assigned directions. Reid lingered a second and watched, almost in a trance, as Morgan walked towards the boat. His head felt light and heavy all at the same time and his thoughts were cloudy.

"You commin, Reid, or are you gonna let Hotch and Rossi find all the good stuff?" Morgan asked as he looked back at him. The words snapped him back to the present and he looked up from where he had apparently been studying the ground.

He followed Morgan up the ramp that was meant to let passengers onto the boat and noticed the frayed and worn blue carpet beneath his feat. He put his hands on the railing to ground himself further and dragged his fingers over the somehow smooth surface as he walked up the ramp. The whole thing felt so surreal. They reached the stairwell that led down to, well, something, and the railing ended abruptly, leaving Reids hand hanging in the air, grasping for something that wasn't there. It was sheltered by the overhanging of the top deck and Reid could see a place where there had most certainly been a happy emblem of some ship name or another. It had been worn away, chipped at, until there was nothing left/

The stairs themselves were covered in the same blue carpeting that the ramp had been coated with, but this carpet had fared slightly better than its outdoor counterpart. Although still worn and slightly faded, Reid could see the royal blue color more clearly on these stairs. As he started to descend the stairs behind Morgan, the musty smell of the staircase filled his reminded him of the smell of his basement in his childhood home. That wasn't exactly something he wanted to be thinking about right now.

Instead of focusing on the smell, he looked around the darkened stairwell. There was evidence of pictures that used to be hung on the wall, like old nails stuck in at odd places. He looked to see where they had gone and then he heard a distinct crunch sound under his feet. He looked down and what he had thought was confirmed. A glass photo had shattered under his foot. He looked closer, and although it was hard to make out behind the spindly spiderwebs of cracked glass, it looked to be a picture in black and white of four men, all holding up big fish that they had caught and smiling way too wide for it to be natural. For reasons he didn't care to explore, this made him unmistakably _sad._ Before he ended up crying over this picture, he kept moving and followed Morgan deeper down the stairwell full of shattered memories.

At the bottom of the stairs, there was an old door that looked like it had been kicked open. Reid assumed it was probably the work of Hotch or Rossi. He watched as Morgan slowly pushed past the door and went forward into the darkness. He followed cautiously behind him and saw a long hallway with four doors, two on either side of the hall. Reid could see no sign of Hotch or Rossi and was forced to assume that they had moved further down the hallway, leaving the first two doors for Morgan and him. Morgan stood, bracing himself against the first door on the left, and looked to Reid to get a nod of approval to see if he was ready. Reid nodded.

Morgan pushed open the door and immediately, the room was flooded with light. Reid quickly found the source, a small circular window, surprisingly intact. on the opposite wall. It took a second for his eyes to adjust to the light after the darkness of the hallway. Once they did, he looked around and saw that they were in some sort of living quarters. There was a bunk bed on one wall with ragged blankets limp pillows. On the wall with the window, there hung at layers of different maps and sea charts, which Reid was very excited to take a look at when he had the time. And on the wall across from the bunk bed. Was a simple wooden desk nailed to the floor with two drawers and what looked like a stack of rotting paper and a couple of pens on top of it. Reid was eager to read what was written on them but that could wait.

He walked over to the desk while Morgan walked over to the beds and started examining them. A preliminary glance told him that the papers were letters addressed to someone named Clara and signed by a Captain Cal. He shuffled through the papers and it revealed that the rest of the papers were all the same: to Clara, from Captain Cal. He knew he would take more time to read and analyse the letters later, but for now he turned his attention to the two drawers.

He started by opening the drawer on the right and the first thing he saw was a black and white photograph of a young, beautiful couple. He could tell it was old. The woman was smiling up at the man like he was the only person in the world. Reid looked over at the man and his eyebrows shot up as he recognized him as one of the men from the fishing photo he had stepped on in the hallway. He had a handsome face and a strong jaw. He was gazing at the woman in a similar way to which she was looking at him. He picked up the photo and flipped it over. On the back it read, " Cal and Clara, 1955".

Reid continued looking through the drawer and found a compass engraved with the name Calvin Young, an old feather pen, a worn pearl necklace, and a rusty wrench. Spencer sighed. He knew each of these things had a story, and he was starting to piece it together.

He moved on to the other drawer and saw a black and white photo of a young boy sitting on the knee of a man, who Spencer assumed was his father. He looked at the face of the man and his eyebrows shot up again as he recognised this man from the fishing photo as well. The pieces were definitely starting to come together now. Also in the drawer, was a carefully folded knitted scarf that was practically falling apart, a set of rusty keys, and an old leather baseball glove. He pocketed the keys, thinking they may be useful for something later.

"You find anything good?" Morgan who had come up behind him asked. Spencer had been so engrossed in what he had found that he startled slightly when Morgan had spoken.

"Ah, nothing really useful. Some old keys that might come in handy later, but that's about it. You?" he asked.

"Well, I think some of these pillows and blankets are salvageable, and even if they're not, sleeping on these cots will definitely be better than cold hard wood." he replied. Spencer gave him a half hearted smile, knowing all too well the that bamboo had on ones already precarious if not non-existent sleep schedule.

"Let's check the next room" he said to Morgan as he motioned to the door across the hall.

"Yeah, hopefully, they'll be something interesting in there." Morgan said. Reid didn't reply but followed as Morgan jimmied open the slightly crusted shut door. The setup of this room looked mostly the same, with the beds on one side, the window on the wall across from them, and the desk on the wall across from the beds.

Reid was not surprised to open the other two drawers and find personal belongings and photographs of the other two men who had been in the fishing photo. This time, there wasn't any paper on the desk and it was almost barren, save for a framed photograph that had fallen over. He reached over and picked it up. The photo was of a man that Reid recognised as Calvin, standing in front of a boat, the three other men from the picture were there two. They were all smiling and clapping each other on the backs. With a bit of shock, Reid realised that the boat they were standing in front of in the black and white photo was the same one that he was standing in now. Although it looked very different and a lot more run down now, it was unmistakably the same ship.

Reid wondered what had happened to these four men, what stories they had to tell.

He turned his attention to the wall with the window. There was only one map on this wall instead of the many that had been on the other wall. It was a map of the Central American area. There was a dotted line drawn on it in pen that looked old and was barely distinguishable, but he could tell it went from the tip of Cuba to Cancún. Yes, the pieces were coming together indeed.

A sudden head rush made him sway on his feet slightly. He stumbled backwards until he was sitting on the edge of the bottom bunk of the bed.

"Reid, you okay man?" Morgan asked, concern ebbing into his voice. _Yeah,_ he wanted to say, _I'll be okay as soon as the room stops spinning._

But he didn't. instead he said, "yeah, I'm fine just tired is all. I'm sure I'll feel better after getting a good night's rest on a real bed". Morgan looked doubtful, trying to see through the excuse for cracks, but after a moment his face relaxed back into an easy smile.

"I feel that man. I haven't slept well in days." he said as he sat down on the edge of the bed next to Reid. "Did you find anything good?" he asked. Reid shook his head, but regretted it slightly when the action made everything uproot and start spinning around the room again. But he covered up a slight wince by looking away towards the door.

"I wonder if the others found anything interesting?" he asked. If Morgan noticed the abrupt change of subject, he didn't say anything and for that Spencer was greatful.

"Yeah," Morgan said distantly, "I wonder."

 **AN: Well there that is. I don't know how I feel about this chapter, it just seems different from other things I've written for some reason? Let me know what you think :)**


	13. Red Wine and Rice

**AN: Hey all, contrary to popular belief, I'm actually not dead. I have no excuse for how long this took me so all I can say is I'm sorry. Woopsies. But please don't hate me cause that would make me sad. Enjoy the update, I guess? I'll try to be better about this stuff.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or any of the characters**

Aaron Hotchner felt the thrum of excitement as he stood outside a battered looking door, ready to burst inside. The anticipation of not knowing what would be on the other side filled him with adrenaline. His blood pumped in his ears and it almost sounded like the heavy base from the old stereo he had had in his rock and roll days. This addiction he had to adrenaline was what had made him join the BAU in the first place. It was, in all senses of the word, a perfect job for him.

He looked over to David Rossi who was standing slightly to the side, a familiar look of thrill across the features of his face. He gave a sharp nod to his friend and got one back with the same vigour that he himself had used. Then he did something he had been aching to do for a while; he landed a well aimed kick near where the lock on the door was and the slightly rotten wood gave easily. The door swung open and dirt that had been settled on the top of it for who knows how long came raining down on him. He coughed a few times to clear his lungs and he felt the Dave pat his back a few times. Once the dust settled he stepped inside.

They were in what appeared to be the galley of the ship, the defining feature being the short island in the middle of the room. Hotch was immediately inundated with a feeling of hope but he tried to keep the emotion at bay. He didn't want to be too disappointed if they didn't find anything.

"Do you think there are any non-perishables in here" Dave wondered aloud.

"I sure hope so" Hotch replied. He yanked open a wooden cabinet near to the door and was met with two empty shelves. He ran his finger over the wooden surface and his finger collected dust. He wiped his hands on his pants as he said, "doesn't look too promising". He looked over to where Dave had opened up another cabinet with the same result, a grim look set firmly on his face. Hotch had tried not to get his hopes up but as soon as the possibility of food had been yanked away, he felt himself deflate like a balloon. Just once couldn't something go their way?

He shook his head to clear away the negative thoughts. He had a job to do here and he couldn't let his emotions get in the way. He moved on to the adjacent cabinet and opened it. He peered inside and sighed when he saw the same emptiness. He carefully shut the cupboard and moved on to the next one. Nothing. The next two cabinets held the same result. There was just one more cabinet in the row and Hotch took in a deep breath before opening it. At first glance, it appeared to be empty, but upon further examination there was a silver can hidden in the shadowy back. He let out a breath that he hadn't been aware that he was holding and reached out for the can. His fingers curled around it and he brought it out into the light. He looked at the label and although it was worn, he could tell it was a can of chicken noodle soup.

"Dave, I've got something" he called to the older profiler.

"Good find, that'll go a long way my friend" he replied, looking over Aaron's shoulder. With a pat on the back, Dave went back to his own searching and Aaron placed the beautiful silver can on the dirty kitchen island. He went over to a tall cupboard that neither of them had opened yet. He grabbed the small handle that was attached to it and gave it a pull. It came open with little resistance. There were three shelves in the cupboard. The one on top was empty. The one underneath it had a small, nondescript, burlap sack on it that was full of something. He hefted the substantial bag into his hands and placed it on the island. The movement caught Dave's eye and the older man stopped what he was doing to watch Hotch. Aaron pulled the drawstring on the bag and opened up the top enough to see what was inside.

"Yes! We've got a little feast going now with all the food we've found" said Dave. Inside the bag was a small but important pile of white rice. _This could be the thing between us and starvation_ , he thought to himself.

"We need to save this. We can't eat it all at once" he said.

"I know. I was joking about the feast thing. Sort of" Rossie replied. Hotch chuckled and went back to exploring his cupboard. The rest of it seemed to be empty, which was slightly disappointing. But he was still really happy with the haul they had already found.

"Jackpot!" he heard Rossi exclaim from the other side of the room. He turned around to see the man holding up two very dusty bottles of red wine. Hotch broke out into a smile at the new discovery.

"I'm sure everyone will be very happy with those. I think they will aid with the celebration of our new shelter later" he said. Rossi nodded as he focused on brushing the dust off of the bottles.

"I needed this so bad" he said. The older man held up one of the bottles and kissed it. Hotch let out a genuine laugh at that. Huh, he had forgotten what it felt like to laugh.

Rossi set the two bottles down next to the rice and the can of soup.

"Alright, I think we've found everything useful in this room so let's move on to the next one."

"Once you get the alcohol, there's nothing else useful huh?" Hotch asked him playfully.

"Exactly" Rossi said, walking towards the door that they had first entered. Aaron followed him, knowing they had done a thorough search of the room. When he stepped into the hallway, he saw that the door across from them remained closed. He noted that Reid and Morgan had kicked in the door slightly down the hall from them.

"I'll let you take this one, Dave" he said to his friend.

"Thank you, sir. I would be honored" he replied. With that, Dave leaned back and kicked at the door in just the right place to make it swing inwards.

"After you, sir" Dave said, as he held open the door in an inviting manner.

"Why, thank you" Hotch replied with a curt nod of his head. He stepped inside and saw that it was a sleeping area, probably for some of the ship's crew. There was a bunk bed to his right with ancient looking blankets piled on top. In front of him, there was a wall with a small circular window and not much else on it. To his left there was a simple wooden desk that was secured to the floor. His first thought of the room was that it looked like a nice place to sleep, or at least nicer than their previous sleeping conditions.

"Dave, I'm going to check out the condition of the beds, you take a look at the desk and see if there's anything useful" Hotch instructed. Rossi nodded and headed over to the desk. Hotch himself went over to the bottom bed on the bunk. He peeled back the top blanket, and although it was coated with a layer of dust, it felt pretty good. The blanket and sheets underneath were pretty intact. He moved on to examine the pillows. He picked one up and shook it in an attempt to get rid of some of the relentless dust. When he went to put the slightly cleaner pillow back in its place, something stopped him. Right in the spot where the pillow used to be, there was an old brown journal. Hotch ran his fingers over the cracked old cover and carefully untied the string that bound it shut.

On the inside cover written in scrawling handwriting was the name Henry Davis. Hotch flipped through the yellowed pages and read entry after entry. He slowly pieced together the information he found. Henry had run a tourist business with his five friends on this boat. They would give people tours of different places around the gulf. The last entry is short. The tone is different from the other entries. It says simply, "unexpected storm today, really rough water. Had to evacuate passengers of boat onto emergency raft due to technical difficulties. Wasn't enough room for the crew and I. That's what we get for going over capacity I guess. Hopefully we'll hit land soon. If we don't, I just hope my wife knows I love her." Thoughts raced through Hotch's mind. What had happened to these six men? Why hadn't he heard about anything like this? Wouldn't it be all over the news? He sighed as he placed the journal back under the pillow, hoping to read more thoroughly later.

"You find anything useful?" Dave asked, startling him out of his thoughts.

"Not really. These beds will be nice to sleep on though. How about you?"

"Not unless you count cigarette ash as useful. This guy must've smoked a pack a day" Rossi said with a shake of his head. "I don't know why anyone would do that to themselves" he said.

"Everyone has their vices" Hotch reminded him.

"I guess so" Rossi agreed.

"We should probably get up to the top deck to meet up with the other" Hotch said. "Grab the stuff from the galley and I'll meet you upstairs. I'm just going to tell Reid and Morgan to come with us."

"Will do, captain" Rossi said with a salute. The older man left the room, presumably to follow Hotch's orders. Hotch got up from where he had been sitting on the bottom bunk and walked out into the hallway. He saw that the other door down the hallway was ajar so he knew that Morgan and Reid were in there.

"Morgan, Reid," he called, "we're going to meet up on the top deck now so bring anything useful you found"

"Roger that" Morgan hollered. Hotch walked back towards the stairway and briefly peeked into the galley to make sure that Rossi had gotten everything. He saw that Dave had left the two bottles of wine for him to carry up. He chuckled to himself as he walked into the room and grabbed a bottle in each hand. They deserved this.

Hotch walked up the worn carpeted stairs slowly. It gradually got brighter as he came closer and closer to daylight. He squinted against the harsh light as he ascended the stairs. He arrived on the top deck and let his eyes adjust. He felt wind whipping his hair around his head. The sound of waves crashing violently in the distance eagerly met his ears and he looked out to the rough water. He noted that it was a greenish color today. His nose had to readjust from the musty smell of the lower deck to the salty smell of the sea breeze.

He walked over to where JJ, Emily, and Dave were sitting on some probably once cushioned seats. Now they were bare, worn away to just the skeleton.

"Yes!" Emily said, immediately spotting the two bottles in his hands. Hotch smirked.

"Oh my God!" JJ said, looking up at him. He set the bottles down in the small pile of stuff they had collected. In addition to what he and Dave had brought, he saw that there was a coil of rope, a metal water bottle, and a some fishing line.

"Nice finds" he said gesturing to the pile.

"Not nearly as nice as yours" said Emily and JJ nodded.

"Yeah, I have to agree with you there" said Dave with a laugh.

"We mainly checked out that steering area over there" JJ pointed to where a wooden wheel was situated next to what seemed to be a panel of switches and other mechanics. "None of it's working at all" she said sounding slightly dejected.

"I didn't expect for it to be working so that doesn't come as any surprise" Hotch said.

"Yeah I didn't either but it would've been nice if there was something we could have used to contact someone" she said. The sound of footsteps made him turn his head. He looked over to the direction of the stairwell and saw Morgan and Reid. Reid had an arm slung around Morgan for support and his face was white as a sheet. His head lolled slightly onto the other man's shoulder.

"What happened" Hotch questioned, immediately standing up to go help them. The others stood up too.

"We were coming up the stairs and he just collapsed. Luckily I caught him before he fell too far" Morgan said. Hotch walked over to them and slung Reid's other arm over his shoulder. They walked him over to where the others were waiting in silence.

"M' fine" the younger man slurred.

"You obviously aren't" Hotch retorted. Being so close to Reid, Hotch could feel the heat radiating off of him. He and Morgan carefully set Spencer down onto one of the chairs. JJ came over to them and pressed her hand against his forehead. Hotch looked on with a crease in his brow and his arms folded across his chest, feeling helpless.

"He's burning up" she said looking up at Hotch from where she knelt next to Spencer.

"Do we have any pure water?" he asked no one inparticular.

"I've got some left in this bottle" Emily supplied, holding out one of the silver bottles. Hotch took it from her and held it out to the pale man in front of him.

"Drink" he instructed. Reid just nodded and reached out to take the bottle in shaky hands. He slowly brought it to his lips and drained what was left in the container. Hotch brought his hand up to his head and rubbed at his temples. This was not good. At the rate things were going with Reid, they didn't have much time left.

"Let's look at the wound and see if it's gotten any worse" Morgan suggested.

"Really guys, I'm fine, I just needed some water is all" Reid tried to convince them but the way his hands trembled in his lap didn't fool anyone.

"Nope. We gotta get a look at your cut Spence" JJ said, putting on her best motherly voice. Spencer sighed and lifted up his shirt and began to unravel the bandage. He winced as the cotton material pulled away from his skin.

Hotch's breath hitched when he saw the condition of the injury. He was used to seeing gruesome stuff, but seldom on people he cared about. The cut was swollen up to at least twice its original size. It was crusted with yellow puss and dried blood. There was also some fresh blood dripping out of it. He heard Emily let out a small gasp and saw JJ cover her mouth with her hands. Rossi's face was twisted with what seemed to be sadness and pain. Morgan was looking everywhere but at Reid. Reid himself had his head leaned against the back of the chair, his eyes screwed shut.

"I think," Reid started, "it's best if I don't cover the wound anymore"

"Alright, so we won't cover it. But what do we do next? How do we make it better? There's got to be something we can do" Emily said, panic starting to creep into her voice.

"There's nothing. We can't do anything" Reid said, his eyes still screwed shut. A small sob escaped from JJ and she turned away from the group. Rossi went and put a soothing arm around her.

"Did you all find anything useful in the rooms you searched?" Hotch asked, attempting to change the subject.

"Not really, it was just two bedrooms. There were four beds that seemed like they would be good to sleep in though" Morgan replied.

"We found two beds in one of our rooms as well" Hotch replied.

"That's perfect. A bed for each of us" said emily with forced optimism in her voice. None of them could pretend that they were happy in that moment. There was an overwhelming feeling of grief among them. It hung in the air like a dark cloud that blocked out all the light. The sun was starting to get lower in the sky.

"I say we heat up that can of soup and break out one of those bottles of wine" Rossi said, having rejoined the circle along with a slightly tear stained JJ.

"I am not opposed to that" Hotch admitted. Maybe it would help raise the spirits of his team.

"Perfect," Rossi said, "I'll go get one of those pots that was in the galley"

"Oh, we forgot to tell you guys," JJ said, "we found these" she reached into her pocket and pulled out a small box of matches.

"Yes! That will make starting a fire five times easier" Rossi said, obviously excited.

"Okay, Rossi, you go get the pan, Morgan you come with me to get some firewood, JJ and Emily, you see if you can find some paper to help with starting the fire. I know there's some in the lower deck" Hotch instructed. Everyone nodded, satisfied with their tasks.  
"What about me?" Reid asked, sitting up in his chair with great effort.

"You stay. Rest" Hotch told him. Reid sighed but did as he was told and leaned back in his chair. Everyone got up and went off in the direction of their task. Hotch and Morgan walked silently down the ramp of the boat towards the forest where they knew they would have the most luck with finding firewood. As they picked through the sticks and logs they found on the ground they didn't speak. Once they both had a good armful of the stuff, they mutually decided to head back to the ship.

"Is he gonna die?" Morgan asked, breaking the silence. Hotch paused for a moment before answering.

"I hope not" was the best answer he could come up with. But he couldn't let himself think about that right now. If he did he wouldn't be able to keep going and his team needed him. The rest of the walk back was spent in silence.

When they got back, Hotch saw that the others had completed their tasks and were all back in the circle. JJ had cleared off an area of floor in the center of their circle of chairs. The metal floor would be a fine place to have the fire for now. He and Morgan dumped their armfuls next to the small ball of paper that sat in the middle. JJ got to work setting up a good structure for the fire. Once it was set, she took one of the matches and struck it against the side of the box. It caught quickly and she went about setting the paper ablaze in a few places. The paper went up in flame and soon it caught the surrounding wood on fire. JJ leaned back and brushed her hands together.

"Nice job Jayje" Morgan said. She gave a half hearted smile. They soon set up a situation similar to the one they had at their old camp with a metal grate someone had found above the fire. Rossi set slightly rusty pan on the grate. He then opened up the can of soup with a knife that they had brought with them. He poured the contents into the pot.

The team sat in silence as the soup heated up. Hotch noted that Rossi had also brought up six bowls.

It didn't take long for the soup to be thoroughly heated. Once it was, Rossi took the pan by the handle and doled out six mostly even portions of the soup into the cups he had brought. Everyone took a cup and they all sipped the warm broth slowly.

"I think this is the best thing I have ever eaten" Emily said"

"Better than my cooking?" Rossi asked, feigning a look of hurt. She laughed and went back to eating her soup. Once Hotch finished his soup, he looked around at the others and saw that they had mostly finished. JJ was taking her time and she had a little bit left, but other than that everyone was done.

"How are you feeling, Reid?" he asked.

"Um, actually a little bit better. It feels good to have something in my stomach" he said with a little bit of a smile. Hotch noticed that he was looking slightly less pale and he seemed to be more energized.

"I know this may come as a surprise to you guys," Rossi started, "But I think we should save the wine for another night".

"I hate to say it, but I agree. I think we would be able to enjoy it more later" Emily said.

"Yeah, I'm really tired. I think we should turn in and try out our new beds" Morgan said. The rest of the team nodded. JJ kicked the fire and poked at it until it was down to a few embers. The last thing they needed was for their new home to burn down. They decided together that Morgan would Room with Reid, Hotch with Rossi, and Emily with JJ.

As Hotch was walking down the stairs toward his new cabin, he felt how tired he truly was. When he got to his room, he wordlessly claimed the top bunk, knowing Rossi well enough to know that he would want the bottom anyway. He fell into the slightly stiff mattress and got under the covers. It didn't take long for him to fall into a deep dreamless sleep.

 **AN: Thanks for being patient and again please please don't hate me! I tried to make this update longer to make up for it.**


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